Agell, Charlotte (1959 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Poetry, Young Adult

Charlotte Agell is a children's and young adult author, an illustrator and poet. She was born in Sweden in 1959, lived in Montreal and Hong Kong, and came to Maine in 1977 to attend Bowdoin College. She lives in Brunswick with her family.

She also works as a part time teacher in Yarmouth.

Selected Bibliography

  • Making Paper By Hand (1981)
  • I Swam with a Seal (1985)
  • I Slide into the White of Winter (1994)
  • To The Island (1998)
  • Up the Mountain (2000)
  • Welcome Home or Someplace Like It (2003)
  • Shift (2008)
  • The Accidental Adventures of India McAllister (2010)

Selected Resources

Aldridge, Josephine (1921 - 2009)

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's fiction writer Josephine Aldridge was born in New York City on 18 Feb. 1921. She moved to Maine as a teenager. She and her husband, poet Richard Aldridge lived in Sebasco Estates.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Penny and a Periwinkle (1961) illus. Ruth Robbins
  • The Best of Friends (1963) illus. Betty F. Peterson
  • Reasons and Raisins (1972) written with Richard Aldridge; illus John M. Larrecq
  • A Possible Tree: A Very Special Christmas Story (1993) illus. Daniel San Souci
  • Easter Treasures (1993) illus. Daniel San Souci
  • The Pocket Book (1994) illus. Rene K. Moreno

Selected Resources

Aldridge, Richard (1930 - 1994)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Poet Richard Aldridge was born in New York City and lived in Sebasco Estates, ME.

A 1952 Amherst College graduate, his first published poems appeared in New Poems by American Poets (1953).

After his discharge from the Army in 1955, he was granted a Fullbright Scholarship to study at Worcester College, Oxford. He was awarded a second Fullbright and completed his studies at Worcester in 1957. He then returned to New York where he worked for the publisher Doubleday and Company. He soon resigned his position and moved to Maine.

In 1958 he married Josephine Haskell, whom he had known since childhood. The children's camp where they met was formerly located in the Sebasco Estates area where they lived.

He taught at Morse High School and the Hyde School, both in Bath, until he retired in 1985 to devote his time to writing poetry.

He died in 1994.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry

  • Richard Aldridge: Poems (1957)
  • An Apology Both Ways (1957)
  • Down Through The Clouds, The Sea (1963)
  • Maine Lines 101 Contemporary Poems about Maine (1970) (editor/compiler)
  • The Wild White Rose; Poems (1974)
  • Poetry Amherst; a Sesquicentennial Anthology of Poems by Alumni of Amherst College (1972)
  • Memories of Morse, 1904-1979: A Seventy-Fifth Anniversary Tribute to Morse High School in Bath, Maine (1979)
  • Red Pine, Black Ash (1980)
  • Driving North (1989)
  • Speaking of New England: The Place & Her People: 72 Poems by 56 of Her Poets Past and Present (1993).
  • The Poems of Richard Aldridge (2001)

Children's Book

  • Reasons and Raisins (1972)collaboration with Josephine Aldridge

Selected Resources

Allen, Elizabeth (1832 - 1911)

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Elizabeth Anne Chase Akers Allen was born in Strong, Maine, and grew up in Farmington, having been sent alone to Farmington Academy. Her early life was hard: she was often beaten and locked in the cellar.

Allen had three children and was married three times, first to Marshall Taylor in 1851, whom she divorced; then to Maine sculptor Benjamin Paul Akers in 1860 (he died of tuberculosis in 1861); and finally to Elijah M. Allen in 1865. She eventually moved to Tuckahoe, NY, where she spent the last three decades of her life. She also worked in Washington, D.C., from 1863-1865 as a government clerk, and she lived in Richmond, Va., for a short time.

Her most famous poem, which was later set to music, is 'Rock Me To Sleep, Mother' (1860), a sentimental hymn to motherhood for which Alexander M.W. Ball of N.J. contested ownership. She also published several books of poetry and two series of travel writings from trips to Italy around the time of the U.S. Civil War. Her travel columns tended to emphasize Maine's advantages over the places about which she was writing. She was a pioneering woman journalist in Maine, writing and serving as assistant editor for the Portland Transcript from 1855 until the war, and after the war as associate and literary editor of Portland's Daily Advertiser. She also was a foreign correspondent in Italy for the Boston Evening Gazette.

Selected Bibliography

  • Forest Buds, from the Woods of Maine(1856), written under the pseudonym Florence Percy
  • Poems (1866/1868)
  • Queen Catherine's Rose (1885)
  • The Triangular Society: Leaves From the Life of a Portland Family (1886), her only novel
  • The silver bridge, and other poems (1886)
  • 'Gold nails' to hang memories on: a rhyming review, under their Christian names, of acquantances in history, literature, and friendship (1890) editor
  • The high-top sweeting, and other poems (1891)
  • The proud lady of Stavoren: a legend of the Zuyder Zee (1897), a pamphlet
  • The Ballad of the Bronx (1901)
  • Sunset Song and other verses (1902)

Selected Resources

Amos, Diane (1946 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Romance Novel

Diane Amos (born 30 Dec. 1946), an established Maine artist, lives with her husband in Greene, Maine, with a cat and a dog. They have four grown children.

Amos says that she had never considered writing books until she went with one of her art students to a meeting of the Maine Chapter of the Romance Writers of America. Nine books and seven years later, she got published.

She also teaches art to both children and adults in her art studio.

Selected Bibliography

  • Getting Personal (2003)
  • Mixed Blessings (2004)
  • Winner Takes All (2005)
  • A Long Walk Home (2005)
  • Outlaw Hearts (2007)

Anderson, Will (1940 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Anderson is a writer of informal histories, particularly of beer, baseball, and pop architecture.

A native of Yonkers, NY (born Oct. 12, 1940), and a 1962 graduate of Cornell University, Anderson lives in Bath, ME where he runs a publishing company, Anderson & Sons Publishing.

He was inducted into the Maine Baseball Hall of Fame in summer 2002.

Selected Bibliography

  • Andersons' Turn of the Century Brewery Directory (1968), compiled and published with Sonja Anderson
  • Beers, Breweries, and Breweriana: an informal sketch of United States beer packaging and advertising (1969), with Sonja Anderson
  • The Beer Book: an illustrated guide to American breweriana (1973)
  • The Breweries of Brooklyn: an informal history of a great industry in a great city (1976)
  • The Beer Poster Book (1977)
  • Beer, USA (1986)
  • From Beer to Eternity: everything you always wanted to know about beer (1987)
  • Beer, New England: an affectionate look at our six states' past and present brews and breweries (1988)
  • New England Roadside Delights: a fond look at a wonderfully refreshing aspect of our six states' architectural heritage (1989)
  • Mid-Atlantic Roadside Delights: roadside architecture of yesterday and today in New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania (1991)
  • Was Baseball Really Invented in Maine?: a lively look at the history of professional baseball in Maine and at every Mainer who's ever played in the majors (1992)
  • More Good Old Maine: 101 Past and Present Pop Delights (1993)
  • The Great State of Maine Beer Book (1996)
  • Where Have You Gone, Starlight Cafe?: American's Golden Era Roadside Restaurants (1998)
  • You Auto See Maine: When Old Cars Were Young and For Sale in Maine (1999)
  • Lost Diners and Roadside Restaurants of New England and New York (2001)
  • Those Were the Days (2002), pays tribute to Maine's drive-in theaters and dance halls
  • The Lost New England Nine: The Best of New England's Forgotten Ballplayers (2003)
  • Here's to Hoops!: 100 Years of Maine High School Hoop Highlights (2005), a tribute to some of Maine's best high school basketball history, with a foreword by Cindy Blodgett.
  • When Rock and Roll Rocked Maine: rock 'n roll comes to Maine, 1955-1960 (2007)

Ashbaugh, Regan (1958 - )

Genre: Mystery

Regan Ashbaugh lives in South Portland.

Ashbaugh is a retired investment banker in addition to being a writer. He also serves on charitable foundation boards and is a volunteer firefighter in South Portland.

Selected Bibliography

  • Downtick (1998)
  • In the Red (1999)

Atwell, Debby (1953 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Debby Atwell, born 28 May 1953 in Providence, RI, lives in Rockland, ME.

She received her BFA from the University of New Hampshire in 1976, and is author and illustrator of children's books.

Selected Bibliography

Author/Illustrator

  • Barn (1996), listed in School Library Journal Best Books of 1996
  • River (1999)
  • Pearl (2001)
  • The Thanksgiving Door (2003)
  • The Warthog's Tail (2005)

Illustrator

  • Sleeping Moon by David Lewis Atwell (1994)
  • The Day Hans Got His Way: A Norwegian Folktale by David Lewis Atwell (1992)

Selected Resources

Austin, Phyllis (1941 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Phyllis Austin, an award-winning journalist, was born on 14 Nov. 1941, Austin is a Brunswick resident, and a 1964 graduate of Meredith College, in Raleigh, North Carolina. She moved to Maine in 1969 as an Associate Press reporter. Her reporting focused on Maine state government and New England-wide environmental topics. She is highly regarded for her in-depth investigative articles on Maine forest practices and other environmental issues.

Austin is the recipient of a 1986 Alicia Patterson Journalism Fellowship and two Stanford University John S. Knight Fellowships for Professional Journalists. In addition, she received a Japan Press Association Fellowship. In 1989, the Natural Resources Council of Maine presented her with its Maine Conservation Award. Other awards include the University of Southern Maine's 2000 Distinguished Service Award and the 2001 Maryann Hartman Award from Maine Women in the Curriculum and Women's Studies Program, University of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • On wilderness: voices from Maine (2003) editor
  • Wilderness partners: Buzz Caverly and Baxter State Park (2008)

Babb, James (1949 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Jim Babb, born (18 June 1949) and raised in East Tennessee, lives in Searsport, Maine and has been editor of Gray's Sporting Journal, for which he writes the regular 'Angling' column, since 1997.

He has also worked as a commercial lobster fisherman, a truck driver, a boatyard worker and a reporter.

Selected Bibliography

  • Crosscurrents: A Fly Fisher's Progress (1999)
  • River Music: A Fly Fisher's Four Seasons (2001) illus. by C.D. Clarke
  • Fly-Fishin' Fool: The Adventures, Misadventures, and Outright Idiocies of a Compulsive Angler (2005)

Selected Resources

Baker, Nicholson (1957 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Biography

Novelist and non-fiction writer Nick Baker was born in Rochester, NY, on on 7 Jan. 1957, attended the Eastman School of Music (he was a bassoon player and considered becoming a composer) and Haverford College (PA), receiving a B.A. in English literature (1979). He lives in South Berwick, Maine with his family. His great-grandfather Ray Stannard (1870-1946) was press secretary to U.S. President Woodrow Wilson and won a Pulitzer Prize for an 8-volume biography of Wilson entitled Woodrow Wilson: Life and Letters (1927-1939).

Nick Baker is well known as a critic of the destruction of paper-based media, in particular of the San Francisco Public Library's sending thousands of books to a landfill and eliminating its card catalogs. In addition to Double fold, his book on the subject, he has written a number of articles: 'Letter from San Francisco: The Author vs. the Library' in The New Yorker, 14 Oct. 1996, pp. 50-62. 'Deadline: A desperate plea to stop the trashing of America's historic newspapers' in The New Yorker, 24 July 2000, pp. 42-61 and 'Discards,' also in The New Yorker, 4 April, pp. 64-70+. The Association of Research Libraries' has a web page of (often scathing) reviews and responses to Baker's Double Fold.

It's been said that Baker has an 'almost obsessive concern for minutiae,' and he himself once said that 'his job is 'to celebrate the over familiar.'

Selected Bibliogrpahy

  • The Mezzanine (1988): The thoughts of a young male office worker as he ascends an escalator in his office building. Lots of long footnotes.
  • Room Temperature (1990): Novel in which the action spans a few minutes at a home in Quincy, Massachusetts, where Mike is feeding his baby daughter.
  • U and I (1991), a nonfiction study of how a reader engages with the work of an author, using John Updike as an example. Baker quotes from Updike only from memory.
  • Vox (1992), infamous phone sex novel.
  • The Fermata (1994): Arno Strine, a 35-year-old office temp, writes his autobiography.
  • The Size of Thoughts: Essays and Other Lumber (1996), nonfiction
  • The Everlasting Story of Nory (1998): The world through the eyes of a curious nine-year-old American girl attending school in England.
  • Double Fold: Libraries and the Assault on Paper (2001), nonfiction.
  • A Box of Matches (2003), somewhat of a sequel to Room Temperature.
  • Checkpoint (2004), a novella about a conversation about assassinating the president.
  • The World on Sunday: Graphic Art in Joseph Pulitzer's Newspaper (1898-1911) (2005) with wife Margaret Brentano), a selection of captioned photographs of pages from Sunday editions of Joseph Pulitzer's lavishly illustrated New York paper, The World.
  • A Book of Books (2006), a visual tribute to the printed word, with photographer Abelardo Morell
  • Human Smoke: The Beginnings of World War II, the End of Civilization (2008) a history of WWII that 'questions the commonly held belief that the Allies wanted to avoid the war at all costs but were forced into action by Hitler's unforgiving crusade.'

Selected Resources

Banks, Katherine (1960 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Young Adult

Katherine Anne (Kate) Banks was born (13 Feb. 1960) and grew up in Maine, graduating from Brewer High School. She received her B.A. from Wellesley College and a Master's in history from Columbia University. In the 1980s, she worked for several years as an assistant to Frances Foster in children's books at Alfred A. Knopf.

Banks lived in Rome for eight years and now lives with her family in southern France.

In a 2002 interview with Banks conducted by The Cooperative Children's Book Center, Banks mentions that she:

"...grew up in Maine on the coast. Robert McCloskey was and still is one of my all time favorites. I still cherish A Time of Wonder which captures so effortlessly and beautifully in both words and watercolors a coming storm. Then there is Margaret Wise Brown who to my mind, was unique in her ability to relate to children and express their thoughts and visions through well chosen and organized words -- to invoke wonder at the most simple of things, which is really what life is all about."

Selected Bibliography

  • Alphabet Soup (1988; ill. Peter Sis)
  • Big, Bigger, Biggest Adventure (1990; ill. Paul Yalowitz)
  • The Bunnysitters (1991; ill. Blanche Sims)
  • Baboon (1997; ill. Georg Hallensleben)
  • And If The Moon Could Talk (1998; ill. Georg Hallensleben), won the Boston Globe/Horn Book Award
  • The Bird, the Monkey, and the Snake in the Jungle (1999/2003; ill. Tomek Bogacki)
  • Howie Bowles, Secret Agent (1999; ill. Isaac Millman)
  • The Night Worker (2000; ill. Georg Hallensleben), won the 2001 Charlotte Zolotow Award for outstanding writing in a picture book.
  • A Gift from the Sea (2001; ill. Georg Hallensleben)
  • Dillon Dillon (2002), a young adult book
  • The Turtle and the Hippopotamus (2002; ill. Tomek Bogacki)
  • Walk Softly, Rachel (2003)
  • The Cat Who Walked Across France (2004; ill. Georg Hallensleben)
  • Fox (2007; illus. Georg Hallensleben)
  • Lenny's Space (2007), young adult
  • Max's Dragon (2008; illus. Boris Kulikov)

Selected Resources

Caldwell, Bill (1919 - 2001)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Caldwell was born in New York, moved to Maine in 1964 and in 1965 began a 25-year career as newspaper columnist for the Portland newspapers, writing about 3,000 columns before retiring in 1991.

His home in Damariscotta, called Piper's Bend, was the site of parties for the state's elite, including political leaders, but he also enjoyed the company of artisans, fisherman, and other "regular" people. His 30-foot converted lobster boat, Steer Clear, was recognizable along the Maine coast. He was sometimes stopped for an autograph while cruising.

Before coming to Maine, Caldwell worked for Time-Life and Fawcett Publications, was Asst. Director of Foreign Operations under Pres. Eisenhower, flew bombers in WWII, and lived in Washington DC, New York, London, the Middle East, and Asia, among other places. His alma maters are Cambridge Univ. (Master's degree) and the Sorbonne in Paris.

Caldwell died on January 5, 2001; he lived in Green Valley, Arizona, at the time of his death, with his second wife, Susan Elizabeth Brown, but had been to Portland for a long visit in the summer of 2000. At his request, his ashes were scattered off the coast of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Enjoying Maine: Lively Stories About People and Places, from the Sea Coast to the North Country... (1977)
  • Maine Magic: A Vivid Portrayal of Maine Life, Maine Towns and Island (1979)
  • Islands of Maine: Where America Really Began (1981)
  • The Islands of Casco Bay (1982)
  • Rivers of Fortune: Where Maine Tides and Money Flowed (1983/2002)
  • Lighthouses of Maine (1986/2002)
  • Maine Coast (1988).

Banks, Ronald (1934 - 1979)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Ronald Banks (born 24 Jan. 1934) was a University of Maine history professor. He earned both his Masters and Ph.D. at the Orono campus. He is one of several Univ. of Maine faculty whose scholarly work is included in the 100 books of The Mirror of Maine.

Banks died in April, 1979.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Becomes a State: The Movement to Separate Maine from Massachusetts, 1785-1820 (1970), is described as a fusion "of popular and academic approaches to the study of history that heralded new understanding of a complex era in Maine."
  • Thesis, The Senatorial Career of William P. Frye (1958)
  • Dissertation, The Separation of Maine from Massachusetts, 1785-1820 (1966)
  • Maine During the Federal and Jeffersonian Period: a Bibliographical Guide (1974)
  • A History of Maine; a Collection of Readings on the History of Maine, 1600-1970 (1970/1976).

He also was one of the research contributors to The Maine Bicentennial Atlas: An Historical Survey (1976).

Barnes, Kate (1932 - 2013)

Genre: Poetry

Poet Kate Barnes (born 9 April 1932) is the daughter of Henry Beston and Elizabeth Coatsworth, two other Mainers, both writers themselves. Barnes, who lives on a farm in Appleton, Maine, was Maine's first poet laureate, serving from 1996-2000. Kate Barnes died on June 10, 2013.

Selected Bibliography

  • Crossing the Field (1992)
  • Where the Deer Were (1994)
  • Kneeling Orion (2003)

Selected Resources

Barry, William (1946 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Bill Barry, a Portland resident, is a research historian, book reviewer, editor, and freelance writer. He has also been a guest curator for a number of art and historical exhibits. These include 'Women Pioneers in Maine Art' (1981), 'Made in Maine: Michael Waterman' (1988), and 'Rum Riot and Reform: Maine and the History of American Drinking' (1999; with Nan Cumming)

His research and writing specialties are local and regional art, history and literature. He received an M.A. in American Cultural History from the University of Vermont. After his graduation in 1974, he was employed as Curator of Research at the Portland Museum of Art until the late 1970s. He now works as library research assistant for the Maine Historical Society (MHS) in Portland, and in 2005 was awarded the Neal Woodside Allen Jr., History Award by the MHS, recognizing and honoring outstanding contributions to the field of Maine history. Barry has been a frequent contributor to periodicals including Down East, Portland magazine, Antiques, and Maine History.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mr. Goodhue Remembers Portland: Scenes from the Mid-19th Century (1981) co-authored with Earle G. Shettleworth, Jr.
  • A Vignetted History of Portland Business, 1632-1982 (1982)
  • Tate House: Crown of the Maine Mast Trade (1982) with Frances W. Peabody
  • Pyrrhus Venture (1983) a historic novel written with Randolph Dominic
  • L.L. Bean, Inc., Outdoor Sporting Specialties: a Company Scrapbook (1987)
  • The History of Sweetser Children's Home: a Century and a Half of Service to Maine Children (1988)
  • On the Borders of Yankee Land; An Illustrated History of Maine (1990) with Patricia McGraw Anderson
  • The AIDS Project: A History (1997) ed. by Susan Cummings-Lawrence
  • Deering: A Social and Architectural History with Patricia McGraw Anderson (2010)
  • Maine: The Wilder Half of New England (2012)

Barry edited This was Stroudwater: 1727-1860, by Myrtle Kittridge Lovejoy (1985) and was co-editor, with Gael May McKibben, of A Passionate Intensity: The Life and Work of Dorothy Healy (1992).

He has contributed individual chapters to books such as Pilgrims and Pioneers: New England Women in the Arts (1987) and also wrote the introduction, with Earle Shettleworth, Jr., to American Domestic Architecture: A Late Victorian Style Book (1978), a reprint of Maine architect John Calvin Stevens' 1889 book.

Barter, Christian (1969 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Poet Chris Barter was born (Jan. 5, 1969) and raised in Sullivan, in Hancock County, Maine, earning a B.A. in music composition from Bates College (1990) and an M.F.A. in writing from Vermont College. He lives in Bar Harbor where he works as a trail crew supervisor at Acadia National Park. He has also taught British literature and writing at the College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, and currently teaches at the Stone Coast Summer Writers Conference.

Barter was named by Poets & Writers as one of eighteen debut poets to make their mark in 2005. His poetry has been published in The Georgia Review, Notre Dame Review, Nebraska Review, The Literary Review, The Cafe Review, North American Review, The Louisville Review and The American Scholar.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Singers I Prefer (2005)
  • Acadia trails treatment plan : cultural landscape report for the historic hiking trail system of Acadia National Park, Maine (2006)

Bates, Arlo (1850 - 1918)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Arlo Bates, a poet, novelist, and English professor, was born in East Machias, Maine, on 16 Dec. 1850 and graduated from Bowdoin College in 1876, receiving a Master's degree in 1879. He edited the Boston Sunday Courier from 1880-1893, then became an English professor at M.I.T. (from 1893-1915), all the while writing poems, lyrics, stories, plays, articles, and novels. Bates was married to Harriet Lenora Vose (1856-1886), a writer whose pseudonym was Eleanor Putnum; Bates and Vose collaborated on a novel, Prince Vance, finished the year she died, 1886. Bates himself died on 24 Aug. 1918.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry

  • Sonnets in Shadow (1887)
  • The Poet and His Self (1891)

Drama

  • Love in a Cloud: A Comedy in Filigree (1900)
  • A Mothers' Meeting (1909)

Novels and Stories

  • Patty's Perversities (1881)
  • A Wheel of Fire (1885)
  • Berries of the Brier (1886)
  • A Lad's Love (1887)
  • Prince Vince: the story of a prince with a court in his box (1888), with his wife, Harriet Vose
  • The Pagans (1888/1970)
  • The Philistines (1889/1970)
  • In the Bundle of Time (1893/1970)
  • The Puritans (1898/1968)
  • The Intoxicated Ghost, and other stories (1908/1972)

Non-Fiction, Articles, etc.

  • edited Old Salem (1886), written by Eleanor Putnam, pseudonym for Harriet Vose, his wife
  • Talks on Writing English (1896)
  • Talks on the Study of Literature (1897/1925)
  • Talks on Teaching Literature (1906)

Selected Resources

Fahy, Christopher (1937 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Horror, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry, Short Stories

Christopher Fahy is the author of fifteen books and several story collections. His stories, poems, articles and reviews have appeared in many publications, including Down East, Transatlantic Review, Puckerbrush Review, The Beloit Poetry Journal, Atlanta Review, and The Twilight Zone Magazine. His Poetry and fiction have been included in numerous anthologies, among them Traveling America with Today's Poets, Behond Lament: Poets of the World Bearing Witness to the Holocaust, and The King is Dead: Tales of Elvis Postmortem. He lives in Thomaston.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Fly Must Die (1993)
  • Fever 42 (2002)
  • Breaking Point (2004)
  • Chasing the Sun (2005)

Selected Resources

Baumer, Jim (1962 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Jim Baumer, a native Mainer (born in Lisbon Falls), and currently lives in Durham. He received a degree in business and marketing from the University of Maine. He has worked as a professional writer and marketer for various organizations and businesses, as well working as a freelance writer, publishing articles in local newspapers, independent media outlets, and other venues. He owns and operates RiverVision Press "a small Maine press with an eye towards capturing life in Maine."

Currently, he works for a non-profit that oversees workforce development and retraining, while continuing to write, blog, and teach an occasional writing class at night.

Selected Bibliography

  • When Towns Had Teams (2005)
  • Moxietown (2008)
  • Moxie: Maine in a Bottle (2012)

Selected Web Sites

Fairfield, Roy (1918 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Fairfield -- historian, educator, and writer -- is a native Mainer who lives now in Biddeford, where he's an education consultant. He graduated from Saco's Thornton Academy in 1936 (from which he received Distinguished Alumni recognition in 1997) and from Bates College in 1943. He received a doctorate from Harvard and has taught at Bates College, Ohio University, Athens College in Greece (Fulbright Professor), and Antioch University, where he was the first director of the Antioch-Putney Graduate School (in Vermont and Ohio). He is co-founder of the Union Graduate School in Cincinnati, a university without walls, and has served as chair of the American Council of the European Graduate School and as a faculty member of The Humanist Institute. He was also founding president of the Buckeye Trail, a 1,200-mile hiking and biking trail in Ohio, and is trustee emeritus of the Maine Appalachian Trail Club, which he had served as its second president.

Selected Bibliography

Fiction

  • Amanda's Cove: A Maine Coastal Tale (1989)
  • Of Lobstering and Love: Trials and Triumphs (1990)
  • Condo Carousel: A Novel (1999, set in Miami)
  • Seaside Fables & Other Incites (1994; ill. by Susan Amonss a small book of modern fables)

Poetry

  • Angles of Vision: Poetry (1993)
  • Doing it Over: Images in Reflection (1996).

Non-fiction

  • Sands, Spindles and Steeples, A History of Saco, Maine (1956)
  • The Federalist papers: A Collection of Essays Written in Support of the Constitution of the United States, from the Original Text of Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay (1961; selected and edited by Fairfield). Also published as Federalist Papers: Essays by Hamilton, Madison and Jay (1981)
  • Humanizing the Workplace (1974)
  • Person-Centered Graduate Education (1977/1992)
  • New COMPASS Points: 20th Century Saco (Maine) (1988)
  • Humanistic Frontiers in American Education (edited; 1992)
  • Get Inspired: Releasing Your Creative Self at Any Age (2001);

Selected Resources

Fallon, Tom (1936 - )

Genre: Poetry

Tom Fallon has lived in Maine since childhood. He is a two-time college dropout and retired Rumford paper mill worker. He is a former Maine Times poetry editor, two-time Maine Arts Commission award winner and a former director of the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance. His work has been published in two anthologies, Red Dust New Writing and Maine Speaks.

Fallon writes free verse and likes to experiment with poetry form and is writing short stories of life in a 20th-century real Maine paper mill. He experimented with literary form in his first book Through a Stranger's Eyes rather than following inherited poetry forms. His direction was stimulated by 20th Century art revolution, modern jazz and the Off-Off Broadway theater of New York in the '70's.

Selected Bibliography

  • Pregnant Man 1 (1978)
  • Through A Stranger's Eyes (1978)
  • New Maine Writing 2 - Anthology (1979)
  • Uncensored Paper Mill (1986)
  • The Man on the Moon (1987)
  • Maine Speaks - Anthology (1989)
  • Atlanta's Children
  • In the First Place, The Maine Poems
  • NOW: Works on Paper 1976-2006: Poetry and Antipoetry 2007
  • Creation Now With Words (2020)

Selected Resources

Falwell, Cathryn (1952 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Cathryn Falwell has lived with her family in Gorham, Maine, since 1997. She was born in Kansas City, Kansas, and grew up in several states in the midwest. Before publishing children's books, she earned a BFA in printmaking from the University of Connecticut and worked for 10 years as a graphic designer in Hartford, CT. In addition to making picture books, Falwell presents programs in schools and libraries, and volunteers in youth theatre. Falwell is both an illustrator, proficient with cut paper collage, and a writer. Some of her first books bear the name of her second son, Nicky, while later books entertain as they teach about counting, geometric shapes and letters.

Selected Bibliography

Written and Illustrated

  • Nicky 1-2-3 (1991/1998)
  • Where's Nicky? (1991/1998)
  • Nicky's Walk (1991)
  • Nicky and Grandpa (1991)
  • Nicky and Alex (1991)
  • Clowning Around (1991)
  • Nicky Loves Daddy (1992)
  • Shape Space (1992)
  • We Have A Baby (1993)
  • Feast for 10 (1993)
  • PJ and Puppy (1993/1997)
  • The Letter Jester: A Kids' Guide to Letterforms (1994; chosen as a 'Reading Rainbow' book)
  • Dragon Tooth (1996)
  • Christmas for 10 (1998)
  • Word Wizard (1998)
  • Turtle Splash received a 2001 Lupine Honor Award.
  • Countdown at the Pond (2001/2008)
  • David's Drawings (2001), a subtle story about friendship
  • Butterflies for Kiri (2003)
  • Shape Capers (2007), a first look at shapes in bold colors and rhyme.
  • Scoot! (2008)
  • Mystery Vine: A Pumpkin Surprise (2009)
  • Gobble, Gobble (2011)
  • Pond Babies (2011)
  • Rainbow Stew (2013)
  • The Nesting Quilt (2015)
  • A Space for Me (2020)

Illustrated by Falwell

  • New Moon (1996/2000; written by Pegi Dietz Shea a curriculum guide is available
  • Hands! (1997; written by Virginia Kroll)
  • It's About Time: Poems (1999; written by Florence Parry Heide, Judith Heide Gilliland, and Roxanne Heide Pierce)

Selected Resources

Falwell's website

Cameron, Ardis (1948 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

South Portland resident Ardis Cameron, born June 25, 1948, received her Ph.D. from Boston College in 1986. She is professor of American and New England Studies at the University of Southern Maine and is a noted labor historian whose expertise includes 19th- and early 20th-century mill town culture and New England women in the labor market.

Her articles and book reviews have been published in academic journals such as American History, American Quarterly, International Labor and Working-Class History, Journal of Women's History, Women's Review of books, and Labor: Studies in Working-Class History of the Americas.

Through Cameron's efforts, Northeastern University Press republished Grace Metalious's 1956 novel Peyton Place, with Cameron's analytical introduction. She continued her research on the ways in which Metalious's book affected American culture with financial support from a 2001 Senior Research Fellowship, National Endowment for the Humanities and a 2002 John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship.

Selected Bibliography

  • Radicals of the Worst Sort: Laboring Women in Lawrence, Massachusetts, 1860-1912 (1993)
  • Looking for America: The Visual Production of Nation and People (editor; 2004).

Anthologies

  • Women's Work and Protest: A Century of Women's Labor History (1985)
  • A Companion to American Women's History (2005).

Farmer, Rodney (1947 - )

Genre: Poetry

Rod Farmer is a poet and essayist, publishing over 750 poems in over 150 journals, including Black Fly Review, The Cafe Review, ELF, Psychopoetica. He has also published numerous articles and essays in The Humanist, Maine Historical Society Quarterly, The New England Journal of History, and others.

Farmer, a Vietnam War veteran (1969-70), is also a professor of education and history at the University of Maine at Farmington, teaching middle and secondary education and the history of China, Japan, and India. Farmer has a varied work history as a farm laborer, a dump truck driver, a grocery store clerk, and a high school history and social science teacher. He received his B.S. and M.A. degrees from Central Missouri State University (1969; 1972), and his Ph.D. from the University of Missouri-Columbia (1978). Farmer has been awarded several Fullbrights, to India, Pakistan, and Israel, and two grants to study in Japan. As a professor, he's won the Maine Council for the Social Studies Award for Excellence, given to educators who have contributed to social studies in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Universe Essence 1986
  • Red Ships 2002.

Selected Resources

  • Once Feral. a poem, is available from The College of the Redwoods.

Prentiss, Elizabeth (1818 - 1878)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Poetry

Elizabeth Payson Prentiss was born and raised in Portland, the daughter of a Congregational minister. Before her marriage, she opened her own school (at age 19) and taught at a private girls' school for a few years, but ill health prevented her from continuing her work. She married George Lewis Prentiss, also a Congregational minister, in 1845, and gave birth to 6 children (2 died young).

During her lifetime she lived in Richmond, VA, New Bedford, MA, Newark, NJ, and Switzerland (1858-1860), but her primary home was in New York City, with a summer home in Dorset, VT, where Prentiss died.

Prentiss published her first story in 1834, when she was 16, but didn't write again for publication until the 1850s, after the deaths of two of her children. She published stories in Youth's Companion, The New York Observer, and others.

Selected Bibliography

  • Little Susy's Six Birthdays (1853)
  • The Flower of the Family (1853; first novel)
  • Only a Dandelion, and Other Stories (1854; collected earlier stories)
  • Henry and Bessie; or, What They Did in the Country (1855)
  • Little Susy's Six Teachers (1856)
  • Little Susy's Six Servants (1856)
  • Peterchen and Gretchen, Tales of Early Childhood (1860; transl. from German)
  • The Little Preacher (1867)
  • Fred, and Maria, and Me (1867)
  • The Old Brown Pitcher (1868)
  • Stepping Heavenward (1869)
  • Nidworth (1869)
  • The Percys (1870)
  • The Story Lizzie Told (1870)
  • Six Little Princesses (1871)
  • Aunt Jane's Hero (1871)
  • Golden Hours (1874)
  • Urbane and His Friends (1874)
  • Griselda (1876)
  • The Home at Greylock (1876)
  • Pemaquid (1877)
  • Gentleman Jim (1878)
  • Avis Benson (1879 - posthumously)

Farnsworth, Annie (1964 - )

Genre: Poetry

Farnsworth is a poet, freelance graphic artist and editor of Animus, a journal of Maine writing and images, which donates proceeds to animal welfare organizations. She's also a psychiatric technician in an acute-care mental health facility, a mom, and a Reiki Master. She has a B.A. (English, minor in Art History) from the Univ. of Souther Maine and an M.S. in Metaphysics from the American Institute of Holistic Theology. She lives in Southern Maine.

Her work has been published in The Arts Journal, Puckerbrush Review, The Aurorean, The Larcom Review, Foliage, The Cafe Review.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bodies of Water, Bodies of Light (2001)
  • Angel of the Heavenly Tailgate (2006).
  • Grace Notes: Writings on the Spiritual Connection with our Animal Brethren (2003), editor a collection of poems, essays and illustrations, sales of which benefit animal rescue and welfare organizations.

Selected Resources

Her poems For the Falling Man and The Angel's Retirement Speech are online at Writers' Almanac.

Farrar, Susan (1917 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Susan Farrar was born in Massachusetts and lives now in Bethel, Maine. The self-proclaimed 81-year-old lifelong learner began taking college courses in the 1940s, earning her bachelors degree in theatre from the University of Southern Maine in 1999. She spent years traveling and studying dance before getting her degree. She owns and operates Spring Street Studio, a dance studio in Bethel.

Selected Bibliography

  • Samantha on Stage (1979/1981/1990; illus. Ruth Sanderson), about 11-year-old Samantha, who's always been the best in her ballet class -- but after seeing the new Russian girl dance she begins to wonder who will get the coveted lead in the school's production of the Nutcracker ballet
  • Emily and Her Cavalier (1991), a story of a young woman torn between her passion for ballet and the complications of high-school social life.

Carper, Thomas (1936 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

A resident of Cornish, Maine, poet Tom Carper (born March 11, 1936) taught poetry and creative writing for many years at the University of Southern Maine.

His poems have appeared in Poetry, The American Scholar, and The Formalist, among others.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry

  • Fiddle Lane (1991)
  • From Nature (1995)
  • Distant Blue: Poems (2003).

Non fiction

  • Meter and Meaning: Sharing the Poetic Experience (2003).

Selected Resources

Urquhart, Thomas (1944 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Thomas Urquhart (husband of children's book writer Amy MacDonald) is a principal in Urquhart & Spritz, a Maine-based business and environmental consulting firm.

From 1988-2000, he was executive director of the Maine Audubon Society, and he has worked for BirdLife International in Cambridge, England, the Massachusetts Audubon Society, and the National Audubon Society.

He earned a degree in geography from Oxford University.

Bibliography

  • For the Beauty of the Earth: Birding, Opera and Other Journeys, (2004)

Selected Links

Carroll, Gladys (1904 - 1999)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Born in South Berwick on June 26, 1904, Carroll grew up and lived most of her life in the house her grandfather built. She went to Berwick Academy and then graduated from Bates College in 1925 (B.A. English; honorary degree in 1945).

That same year she married Herbert A. Carroll (Bates '23; died 1983), whose work in psychology took them to Massachusetts, Illinois, New York, and Minnesota, where Gladys Carroll began writing magazine articles and books. She was homesick and eventually the couple returned to Maine, her husband teaching at the Univ. of New Hampshire.

The Carrolls had two children, Warren (1932) and Sarah [Watson] (1941). She died on 1 April 1999.

The Univ. of New Hampshire awarded Carroll an honorary master of arts in 1934, the year her book As the Earth Turns was made into a feature movie. Carroll also received Maryann Hartman Award in 1995 from the University of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

Fiction

  • As the Earth Turns (1933/1995) nominated for the Pulitzer Prize
  • Cockatoo (1929)
  • Land Spell (1930)
  • A Few Foolish Ones (1935)
  • Neighbor to the Sky (1937)
  • Head of the Line (1942)
  • Dunnybrook (1943/1978)
  • While the Angels Sing (1947)
  • West of the Hill (1949)
  • Christmas without Johnny (1950)
  • One White Star (1954)
  • Sing Out the Glory (1957)
  • Come with Me Home (1960)
  • The Road Grows Strange (1965)
  • The Light Here Kindled (1967)
  • Christmas Through the Years (1968)
  • Man on the Mountain (1969)
  • Next of Kin (1974)

Non-Fiction

  • Only Fifty Years Ago (1962)
  • To Remember Forever: The Journal of a College Girl, 1922-1923 (1963)
  • New England Sees it Through, and Mist Through the Mirror (1969)
  • Years Away from Home (1972)
  • The Book That Came Alive (1979)

Selected Resources

van de Wetering, Janwillem (1931 - 2008)

Genre: Children's Literature, Mystery, Non-Fiction

Van de Wetering had been a motorcycle gang member in South Africa, a Zen disciple in Japan, and a volunteer police cop in Amsterdam.

He was born in Rotterdam on 12 Feb. 1931, raised in Amsterdam, and also lived in Colombia, Peru, and Australia, and in 1975 he settled in a post-and-beam home (with several outbuildings) on 65 acres on the Union River in Surry, Maine.

He attended Delft University (1948), the College for Service Abroad (1949-51), Cambridge University (1951), and the University of London (1957-58).

Although he didn't start publishing until he was in his 40s, Van de Wetering wrote over 35 books, including crime novels featuring two Dutch detectives, children's books, and non-fiction.

He died in 2008.

Selected Bibliography

  • Outsider in Amsterdam (1975)
  • Tumbleweed (1976)
  • The Corpse on the Dike (1976)
  • Death of a Hawker (1977)
  • The Japanese Corpse (1977)
  • The Blond Baboon (1978)
  • The Maine Massacre (1979)
  • The Mind-Murders (1981)
  • Bliss & Bluster (1982)
  • The Butterfly Hunter (1982)
  • The Streetbird (1983)
  • The Safe Feeling
  • Inspector Saito's Small Satori (1985)
  • The Rattle-Rat (1985)
  • Murder By Remote Control (1986)
  • Hard Rain (1986)
  • The Sergeant's Cat (1987)
  • Seesaw Millions (1988)
  • Distant Danger: The 1988 Mystery Writers of America Anthology (1988, editor)
  • Just A Corpse at Twilight (1994)
  • Mangrove Mama...And Other Tropical Tales of Terror (1995)
  • The Hollow-Eyed Angel (1996)
  • The Perfidious Parrot (1997)
  • Judge Dee Plays His Lute: A Play and Selected Mystery Stories (1997/1998)
  • The Amsterdam Cops (1999)

Children's Books

  • Little Owl (1978)
  • Hugh Pine (1980)
  • Hugh Pine and the Good Place (1986)
  • Hugh Pine and Something Else (1989)

Auto/Biographical Works include

  • The Empty Mirror: Experiences in a Japanese Zen Monastery (1973)
  • A Glimpse of Nothingness: Experiences in an American Zen Community (1975)
  • Afterzen: Experiences of a Zen Student Out of His Ear (1999)
  • Robert van Gulik: His Life, His Work (1988),

Selected Links

The Philosophical Exercises of Janwillem van de Wetering (article by Henry Wessells)

Feigon, Lee (1945 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Feigon, born Sept. 13 1945, in Tampa, Florida, has a B.A. from the University of California at Berkeley, a M.A. from the University of Chicago, and a Ph.D. in Chinese history from the University of Wisconsin at Madison. He was a longtime professor of Chinese history and chair of the Department of East Asian Studies at Colby College. Now he's a research associate at the Center for East Asian Studies of the University of Chicago. He's also listed on the editorial board of The Journal of Contemporary China. He made a documentary film about Mao, titled The Passion of Mao.

Selected Bibliography

  • Chen Duxiu: Founder of the Chinese Communist Party (1983)
  • China Rising: The Meaning of Tiananmen (1990)
  • Demystifying Tibet: Unlocking the Secrets of the Land of the Snows (1996)
  • Mao: A Reinterpretation (2002).

Selected Resources

Voigt, Cynthia (1942 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Young Adult

Cynthia Voigt, a resident of Deer Isle since the early 1990s, was born in Boston on 25 Feb. 1942, raised in Connecticut, went to Dana Hall School, and is a 1963 Smith College graduate.

She was a high school English teacher in Glen Burnie and Annapolis, Maryland, and continued teaching during the early years of her writing career.

Voigt's first book was published in 1981. The idea for the book came to her when she saw several children waiting by themselves in a car. Although she was working on a novel that would later be published as Building Blocks (1984), she put it aside and began writing Homecoming, the story of the abandoned Tillerman children. When it was published, she received immediate favorable recognition from reviewers and quickly became and remains one of the most popular writers of young adult books.

Voigt addresses many of the issues and fears faced by today's adolescents including friendship/popularity, physical handicaps, sexual abuse, loneliness/isolation and drug addiction.

In addition to her contemporary novels, Voigt has written several historical novels set in the middle ages (Kingdom Series).

Her versatile writing talent is also expressed in her mystery novels.

In 1995, Voigt received the Margaret Alexander Edwards Award. The award, named after a noted Young Adult Services librarian, is given in recognition of a writer's collective work rather than a single book.

She was the 2004 recipient of the Maine Library Association Youth Services Section's Katahdin Award for lifetime achievement in children's literature.

Selected Bibliography

Children's Book

  • Angus and Sadie (2005)
  • Little Bird pictures by Lynne Rae Perkins (2020)

Young Adult Books

Tillermans Books

  • Homecoming (1981)
  • Dicey's Song (1982)winner ofthe 1983 Newbery Award
  • Sons From Afar (1987)
  • Seventeen Against the Dealer (1989)
  • A Solitary Blue (1993) 1994 Newbery Honor Book
  • Come a Stranger (1995)

Issues

  • Bad Girls (1996)
  • Bad, Badder, Baddest (1997)
  • It's Not Easy Being Bad (2000)
  • Bad Girls in Love (2002)
  • Bad Girls, Bad Girls, Whatcha Gonna Do? (2006)
  • Izzy, Willy-Nilly (1986)
  • When She Hollers (1994)
  • The Runner (1985)
  • Orfe (1992)

The Kingdom Series

  • Jackaroo (1985)
  • On Fortune's Wheel (1990)
  • The Wings of a Falcon (1993)
  • Elske (1999)

Mysteries

  • The Vandemark Mummy (1991)
  • The Callender Papers (1983)Edgar Award winner

Other Works

  • Tell Me If The Lovers Are Losers (1982)
  • Stories About Rosie (1986)
  • Shore Writers' Sampler II: Stories And Poems (1988)
  • Tree By Leaf (1988)
  • Glass Mountain: A Novel (1991)
  • David and Jonathan (1992)
  • The Rosie Stories (2003
  • Good Morning, Rosie (2003)

Selected Resources

  • Presenting Cynthia (1995)

Selected Links

Corrigan, John (1970 - )

Genre: Mystery, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

A native of Augusta, Maine, Corrigan received his B.A. in English from State University of New York at Fredonia and his M.F.A. from the University of Texas at El Paso. He has worked as a journalist and freelance writer, and was a literature instructor and the director of the Visiting Writer Series at the Maine School of Science and Mathematics in Limestone, Maine. He also taught at Northern Maine Community College in Presque Isle, Maine.

Corrigan has published poems, articles of academic non-fiction, and mysteries. His poems have been published in The River Review/La Revue Riviere, Echoes, Red Owl, The Rio Grande Review, Frost at Midnight, Storyteller, The Advocate, and other literary journals. Corrigan also writes a monthly column in Golf Today

Selected Bibliography

Non-fiction

  • Teaching Dyslexics to Write: A Guide for The Composition Instructor, which appears as a chapter in Richard Graves' Writing, Teaching, Learning: A Sourcebook (1999)

Mystery series featuring pro golfer and Maine native Jack Austin

  • Cut Shot (2001)
  • Snap Hook (2004)
  • Center Cut (2004)
  • Bad Lie (2005)
  • Out of Bounds (2007).

Walker, David (1942 - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet David Walker was born in the village of Head Tide in Alna, Maine. He is a Bowdoin College graduate and also studied at New College, Oxford, where he received a B. Litt. degree in 1967.

He taught for four years at the University of Canterbury, New Zealand, has taught at Holy Cross and Bowdoin and at the University of Southern Maine.

His poems have appeared in Beloit Poetry Journal and The Maine Reader: The Down East Experience, 1614 to the Present (1991).

Selected Bibliography

  • Moving Out (1976)
  • Two Poets: David Walker, Jeffrey Holman (1975)
  • Voiceprints: David Walker (1989)

Walling, Sandra (1948 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Author and illustrator Sandy Walling was born in Red Bank, NJ, and moved to Maine in 1971. She lives in Yarmouth, Maine.

A 1999 graduate of University of Southern Maine, Walling worked in the printing industry for most of her life, including for Maine Medical Center, managing its printing/mail and copy facilities; and for newspapers, printers, an advertising agency, and as marketing production manager for Thos. Moser Cabinetmakers. She has also been a board member of the Maine Graphic Arts Association.

After retiring in 2002, she returned to school to study computer graphics.

Walling has published several children's books. The first was born of her frustrating experiences as a child with dyslexia; the book helps children learn that there is a correlation between numbers, words and objects. Her books are published by Abernathy Publishing House, which Walling founded in 2003.

Selected Bibliography

Writer and Illustrator

  • A Day at the Beach: A Seaside Counting Book From One to Ten (2003)
  • ABC's at the Zoo! (2004)
  • Herman, the Hermit Crab (May 2007)

Illustrator

  • Herman the Hermit Crab (2007) by Elaine Fantle Shimberg
  • and Helga the Hippopotamouse (2008) by Elaine Fantle Shimberg.
  • Max, the Magical Moose (2009) by Elaine Fantle Shimberg
  • Emily goes to Camp Lobster Claw (2009) by Elaine Fantle Shimberg

Selected Links

Abernathy House Publishing

Fickett, David (1958 - )

Genre: General Fiction

David Fickett lives with his wife and children in Winter Harbor, Maine. His short stories have appeared in Puckerbrush Review, The Peninsula Review, and Wilmington Blues. Fickett is a member of the Peninsula Writers Group in Gouldsboro.

Selected Bibliography- Nectar 2002 The novel, set in rural Maine, crosses three generations of beekeepers to tell the story of Regina Merritt, a determined woman who is forced at a young age to choose between happiness and survival.

Selected Resources

  • Sensible Shoes a short story is online through collectedstories.com.

Wasson, George (1855 - 1932)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Short Stories

George S. Wasson, noted maritime painter and writer, was born in Groveland, Massachusetts. His father's family, however, was from the Penobscot Bay area. As a child, George spent most of his summers with his grandfather, 'Squire' David Wasson in Brooksville.

When he was seventeen, his father, Rev. David Atwood Wasson, took George to Stuttgart, Germany. He soon enrolled in the Art Academy, where he studied for three years.

After his return to Massachusetts, he spent the summers sailing along the New England coast, sketching scenes he would later paint in his Boston studio.

In 1889 he and his wife and their two sons moved to a new home in Kittery Point, Maine. He remained there, painting and writing, until 1916 when he and his wife and their son's widow moved to Bangor.

His short stories, many of which were first published in literary magazines, grew out of his great respect and friendship for his Kittery Point neighbors and his delight in their colorful expressions. In fact, his writing is still praised for the authenticity of the coastal vernacular expressions.

After two of his history articles, The Vanished Pinky and The Old Rockland, Maine, Lime Trade, were printed in Old-Time New England magazine, Wasson was encouraged to write a book-length maritime history.

In 1932, his Sailing Days on the Penobscot; The River and Bay as They Were in the Old Days was published. Maine author Lincoln Colcord (q.v.) contributed a detailed list of vessels constructed on the Penobscot River and Bay. The book, minus Colcord's detailed tables, was republished in 1949.

Selected Bibliography

  • Cap'n Simeon's Store (1903)
  • The Green Shay (1905)
  • Home From Sea (1908)

Selected Resources

Van Dusen, Chris (1960 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Born in Portland, Maine, Van Dusen grew up in central Massachusetts. He returned to Maine in 1985 and lives in Camden.

He studied painting and illustration at the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth, graduating in 1982 with a BFA, after which he was an art director and cartoon editor of a magazine for teenagers. He's done illustration work for L.L. Bean, Maine Healthy Beaches Program, and Ringling Bros. and Barnum and Bailey Circus, among others, and was profiled in the May 2003 issue of DownEast Magazine.

Selected Bibliography

Written and illustrated

  • Down to the Sea with Mr. Magee (2000)
  • A Camping Spree with Mr. Magee (2003)
  • If I Built a Car (2005)
  • The Circus Ship (2009) Lupine winner
  • Randy Riley's Really Big Hit (2012)
  • If I built a House (2012) winner, 2013 New England Book Award for Children's book

Illustrated

Kate DiCamillo's Mercy Watson series:

  • Mercy Watson to the Rescue (2005)
  • Mercy Watson Goes for a Ride (2006)
  • Mercy Watson Fights Crime
  • Mercy Watson: Princess in Disguise (2007)
  • Mercy Watson Thinks Like a Pig (2008)

Selected Links

Chris van Dusen's website

Wait, Lea (1946 - 2019)

Genre: Children's Literature, Mystery, Young Adult

Lea Wait, who lived in Edgecomb, was the author of children's historical novels (for kids ages 8-12), and a mystery series for adults starring antique print dealer Maggie Summer. She is also an antique prints dealer herself.

Wait grew up in suburban New Jersey (summering in Maine), was a drama and English major at Chatham College in Pittsburgh, PA, attended grad school at New York University, studying American civilization, and worked in corporate public relations.

In her 20s and single, she adopted four girls from Korea, Thailand, Hong Kong and India (all now grown), and she founded a support group for single adoptive parents; she is still on the board of the National Council for Single Adoptive Parents.

Selected Bibliography

Children and Young Adults

  • Stopping to Home (2001)
  • Seaward Born (2003)
  • Wintering Well (2004)
  • Finest Kind (2005)
  • Uncertain Glory (2014)
  • Pizza to Die For (2017)
  • For Freedom Alone (2018)
  • Contrary Winds: A Story of the American Revolution (2018)

Adult Mystery Series books

Antique Print Mystery series

  • Shadows at the Fair: An Antique Print Mystery (June 2002)
  • Shadows on the Coast of Maine: An Antique Print Mystery (2003)
  • Shadows on the Ivy (2004)
  • Shadows at the Spring Show: An Antique Print Mystery (2005)
  • Shadows of a Down East Summer: An Antique Print Mystery (2011)
  • Shadows on a Cape Cod Wedding: An Antique Print Mystery (2013)
  • Shadows on a Maine Christmas: An Antique Print Mystery (2014)
  • Shadows on a Morning in Maine: An Antique Print Mystery (2016)

Non-Fiction

  • The Only Writing Series You'll Ever Need: Writing Children's Books (2007)

Mainely Needlepoint Mystery Series

  • Twisted Threads (2014)
  • Threads of Evidence (2015)
  • Dangling by a Thread (2016)
  • Thread and Gone (2016)
  • Tightening the Threads (2017)
  • Thread the Halls (2017)
  • Thread Herrings (2018)
  • Thread on Arrival (2019)
  • Thread and Buried (2019)

Post Civil War Mysteries

  • Justice and Mercy (2017)

Selected Links

Field, Rachel (1894 - 1942)

Genre: Children's Literature, Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction

Rachel Field was born in New York City, grew up in western Mass., and summered as an adult on Sutton's Island, one of the Cranberry Isles off of Mount Desert. Although she died in her 40s, she was a prolific writer of children's and adult books, and she was the first woman to win the Newbery Medal, for Hitty: Her First Hundred Years (1929). A sequel to Hitty, titled Rachel Field's Hitty: Her First Hundred Years with New Adventures, was written by Rosemary Wells and illustrated by Susan Jeffers (1999). A Memorial Horn Book for Rachel Field was published in 1942. She was also featured in Down East Today (1938; Virginia Smith Hall), along with Mary Ellen Chase, Gladys Hasty Carroll, and Robert P. Tristram Coffin.

Selected Bibliography

Books for Children

  • The Pointed People (1924/1930; verses)
  • Taxis and Toadstools (1926; verses)
  • An Alphabet for Boys and Girls (1926)
  • Eliza and the Elves (1926; illustrated by Elizabeth MacKinstry)
  • General Store (1926/1988; in verse; illustrated by Giles Laroche)
  • General Store (1926/1988; in verse; illustrated by Nancy Winslow Parker)
  • If Once You Have Slept on an Island (1926/1933/1993/1995; illustrated by Iris Van Rynbach)
  • A Little Book of Days (1927; verse)
  • Little Dog Toby (1928)
  • Hitty: Her First Hundred Years (1929) experiences of a wooden doll; Newbery winner 1930; illustrated by Dorothy Lathrop)
  • Calico Bush (1931) Maine girl in 1743; wood engravings by Allen Lewis
  • Hepatica Hawks (1932; wood engravings by Allen Lewis)
  • The Bird Began To Sing (1932; illustrated by Ilse Bischoff)
  • Just Across the Street (1933)
  • Susanna B. and William C. (1934)
  • All Through the Night (1940/1955 edition illustrated by Shirley Hughes)
  • Prayer for a Child (1944/1984; illustrated by Elizabeth Orton Jones; won Caldecott Medal in 1945)
  • The Rachel Field Story Book (1958; illustrated by Adrienne Adams)
  • A Road Might Lead to Anywhere (1990; illustrated by Giles Laroche)

Books for Adults

  • Points East, Narratives of New England (1930/1933; in verse)
  • Branches Green (1934; illustrated by Dorothy Lathrop; poems)
  • God's Pocket: The Story of Captain Samuel Hadlock, Junior, of Cranberry Isles, Maine (1934/1999)
  • Time Out of Mind (1935/1938; fiction; four generations of shipbuilding family in Maine)
  • Fear is the Thorn (1936; poems)
  • To See Ourselves (1937; co-authored with Arthur Pederson; fiction)
  • All This and Heaven Too (1938/2003; Charles Boyer starred in the movie): Fictional combining of one of the most notorious murder cases in France with a period of American history covering New England and New York 1850 to 1875.
  • Christmas Time (1941; poems)
  • And Now Tomorrow (1942/1967): A young woman must reevaluate her relationships after an illness leaves her deaf.

Plays

  • Plays of the 47 Workshop (1918/1923; includes "Three Pills in a Bottle")
  • Six Plays (1924/1927; for high-school-aged children): 'Cinderella Married,' 'Three Pills in a Bottle,' 'Columbine in Business,' 'The Patchwork Quilt,' 'Wisdom Teeth,' and 'Theories and Thumbs.'
  • The Atlantic Book of Junior Plays (1924; with Thomas Charles Swain)
  • The Cross-Stitch Heart and other plays (1927/1928): 'Greasy Luck,' 'The Nine Days' Queen,' 'The Londonderry Air,' 'Bargains in Cathay: A Comedy in One Act,' and 'At the Junction: A Fantasy for Railroad-Stations in One Act.'
  • Patchwork Plays (1930; juvenile): 'Polly Patchwork: A Comedy in Three Scenes,' 'Little Square-Toes,' 'Miss Ant, Miss Grasshopper and Mr. Cricket,' 'Chimney-Sweeps' Holiday,' and 'The Sentimental Scarecrow.'

Miscellany

  • The Magic Pawn Shop; a New Year's Eve Fantasy (1927; illustrated by Elizabeth MacKinstry)
  • The White Cat, and other old French fairy tales by Mme. La Comtesse d'Aulney (1928/1967; arranged by Field)
  • American Folk and Fairy Tales (1929; selected by Rachel Field; illustrated by Margaret Freeman)
  • People from Dickens: A Presentation of Leading Characters from the Books of Charles Dickens (1935; illustrated by Thomas Fogarty)
  • Sung under the Silver Umbrella: Poems for Young Children (1935; includes poems for children by Field, Elizabeth Coatsworth, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and Laura E. Howe Richards; illustrated by Dorothy Lathrop)
  • Ave Maria; an interpretation from Walt Disney's 'Fantasia' (1940; lyric by Rachel Field)
  • Christmas: A Book of Stories Old and New (1950; selected by Alice Dalgliesh; includes stories by Field and Celia Thaxter; illustrated by Hildegard Woodward)

Selected Resources

Clark, (Arley) Carman (1917 - 2005)

Genre: Mystery, Non-Fiction

Carman Clark, born on April 17, 1917 in Old Forge, N.Y., lived on a poultry farm in Union, Maine, from 1949 until her death on Nov. 28, 2005. She was a regular columnist and the gardening editor for the Camden Herald; she wrote the paper's From the Orange Mailbox column for over 20 years.

Clark's first career was as a school teacher specializing in language arts at Thomaston Junior High School. She was the mother of librarian John Clark and mystery novelist Kate Flora, who interviewed her mother in the Spring 2001 issue of Mystery Readers Journal.

She died in Nov. of 2005.

Selected Bibliography

  • From the Orange Mailbox: Notes from a Few Country Acres (1985)
  • The Maine Mulch Murder

Waterhouse, Debra (1960 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Debra Waterhouse, M.P.H., R.D., is a Portland native who now lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.

She is a registered dietitian and has written several books about women and weight.

Bibliography

  • Outsmarting the Female Fat Cell (1993)
  • Why Women Need Chocolate (1995)
  • Like Mother, Like Daughter (1997)
  • Outsmarting the Mid-Life Fat Cell: Winning Weight Control Strategies for Woman over 35 to Stay Fit Through Menopause (1998)
  • Outsmarting Female Fatigue: 8 Energizing Strategies for Lifelong Vitality (2001)
  • From Tired to Inspired: 8 Energizing Ways to Overcome Female Fatigue (2001)
  • Outsmarting the Mother-Daughter Food Trap: How to Free Yourself from Dieting and Pass on a Healthier Legacy to Your Daughter (2001)
  • Outsmarting the Female Fat Cell -- After Pregnancy: Every Woman's Guide to Shaping Up, Slimming Down, and Staying Sane After the Baby (2002)

Waterman, Steven (1946 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Steven L. Waterman was born in South Hope, Maine, and lives in South Thomaston. He is a writer, photographer, and seasonal commercial lobsterman.

He writes about his experiences as a diver and photographer. He spent 13 years in the Navy as a Diver First Class. He was an underwater cameraman as part of Combat Camera Group's Underwater Photo Team. During the Vietnam War, he was part of Underwater Demolition Team Thirteen and served as an camera operator and intelligence photographer.

Since then, he has worked on a few television commercials and on one Discovery Channel Production called "Trap Day on Monhegan," in which he did a large portion of the underwater filming.

Waterman has had stories published in Soldier of Fortune, Yankee magazine, Down East, National Fisherman, Working Waterfront, and Island News.

Bibliography

  • Just a Sailor: A Navy Diver's Story of Photography, Salvage, and Combat (2000)

Finch, Annie (1956 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Originally from New York and with longstanding family ties to Maine, writer, poet, translator, editor, critic and teacher Annie Finch lives in Falmouth, Maine with husband Glen Brand, an environmental activist with the Sierra Club, and their children. She is director of the Stonecoast low-residency MFA at the University of Southern Maine. Previously, she was associate professor of English and member of the graduate faculty of the creative writing program at Miami University in Ohio. Finch attended Simon's Rock Early College (Mass.), received a B.A. (English) from Yale in 1979, an M.A. (creative writing) from the University of Houston in 1986, and a Ph.D from Stanford (literature) in 1990.

Finch's poems have appeared in numerous journals including Yale Review, Kenyon Review, Prairie Schooner, Fulcrum Magazine, Poetry, Paris Review, and in anthologies including The Norton Anthology of World Poetry. She has collaborated on musical and theater productions including, with composer Deborah Drattell, the opera 'Marina: A Captive Spirit' based on the life of poet Marina Tsvetaeva (2003, American Opera Productions).

Selected Bibliography

  • The Encyclopedia of Scotland (1982/2004)
  • The Ghost of Meter: Culture and Prosody in American Free Verse (1993)
  • A Formal Feeling Comes: Poems in Form by Contemporary Women (1994)
  • Catching the Mermother (1996)
  • Eve (1997)
  • After New Formalism: Poets on Form, Narrative, and Tradition (1999)
  • Carolyn Kizer: Perspectives on Her Life & Work (2001), co-edited with Johanna Keller and Candace McClelland
  • Season Poems (2002)
  • An Exaltation of Forms: Contemporary Poets Celebrate the Diversity of Their Art (2002), co-edited with Kathrine Varnes
  • Calendars (2003)
  • Home Birth (2004)
  • The Body of Poetry: Essays on Women, Form, and the Poetic Self (2005)
  • Lofty Dogmas: Poets on Poetics (2005), co-edited with Maxine Kumin and Deborah Brown
  • Complete Poetry and Prose: A Bilingual Edition (2005/2006)
  • A Poet's Craft: A Comprehensive Guide to Making and Sharing Your Poetry (2012)

Selected Resources

White, E. B. (1899 - 1985)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Born in Mt. Vernon NY, but a Brooklin resident for many years (and a childhood summer resident of Belgrade, Maine), E. B. (Andy) White is best known as the author of the children's classics Charlotte's Web (1952), Stuart Little (1945) (which together won the 1970 Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal), and The Trumpet of the Swan (1970). Charlotte's Web was set in Brooklin and at the Blue Hill Fair. He also wrote for many years for The New Yorker magazine.

White published One Man's Meat (1942), a book of essays on Maine life, from columns originally written for Harper's magazine.

White died in October of 1985.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ho-Hum: Newsbreaks from the New Yorker (1931)
  • The Owl in the Attic and Other Perplexities (1931)
  • Everyday is Saturday (1934)
  • Quo vadimus?, or, The Case for the Bicycle (1939)
  • The Wild Flag: Editorials from the New Yorker on Federal World Government and Other Matters (1946)
  • Here is New York (1949)
  • Is Sex Necessary, or Why Do You Feel the Way You Do? (1950)
  • The Second Tree from the Corner (1954)
  • The Points of My Compass: Letters from the East, the West, the North, and the South (1962)
  • An E. B. White Reader (1966)
  • The Elements of Style (1972)
  • The Letters of E. B. White (1976)
  • The Essays of E. B. White (1977)
  • Poems and Sketches of E. B. White (1981)
  • Writings from the New Yorker, 1927-1976 (1990)

Selected Resources

  • E.B. White : a biography by Scott Elledge (1984)
  • E. B. White: Some Writer by Beverly Gherman (1992) -- for juvenile audiences
  • E.B. White by Aimee LaBrie (2004) -- for juvenile audiences
  • The story of Charlotte's Web: E. B. White's eccentric life in nature and the birth of an American classic by Michael Sims (2011)
  • Vertical File Maine State Library
  • Encyclopedia of World Biography E. B. White entry
  • Material from Maine State Library files

Wiggin, Kate Douglas (1856 - 1923)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction

Born in Philadelphia on 28 Sept. 1856, Kate Douglas Wiggin was raised there and in Portland and Hollis, Maine, where she lived for many years.

She attended the Gorham Female Seminary, the Morison Academy (Baltimore), and the Abbott Academy (Andover, Mass.

In 1873 she moved with her family to Santa Barbara, Calif., where eventually Wiggin directed a private kindergarten. She and her sister, Nora Archibald Smith, together established the California Kindergarten Training School. Wiggin herself was head of the Silver Street Kindergarten until she married lawyer Samuel B. Wiggin in 1881. They moved to New York City in 1884.

After her husband died in 1889, Wiggin moved back to Hollis where she wrote the children's book Timothy's Quest (1890 and the adult novel The Village Watch-Tower (1895). She traveled widely and remarried in 1895 to George C. Riggs, a New York businessman.

Bowdoin College awarded her an honorary degree in 1904.

Selected Bibliography

Children's Books,

  • The Birds' Christmas Carol (1887)
  • Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm(1903)
  • The New Chronicles of Rebecca (1907)
  • The Story of Patsy (1883)
  • Timothy's Quest (1890)
  • Polly Oliver's Problem (1893)
  • The Posy Ring - A Book of Verses for Children (1903)
  • Pinafore Palace: A Book of Rhymes for the Nursery (1907)
  • Susanna and Sue (1909)
  • Mother Carey's Chickens (1911)

Books for Adults

  • The Story Hour (1890, with her sister Nora)
  • A Cathedral Courtship (1893)
  • The Village Watch-Tower (1895)
  • The Republic of Childhood (1895)
  • Marm Lisa (1896)
  • Hymns for Kindergarteners (18??)
  • Penelope's Progress (1898)
  • Penelope's English Experiences (1900)
  • Penelope's Irish Experiences (1901)
  • The Diary of a Goose Girl (1902)
  • The Affair at the Inn (1904)
  • Rose O' the River (1905)
  • The Old Peabody Pew: A Christmas Romance of a Country Church (1907)
  • Arabian Nights, Their Best Known Tales (1909)
  • The Story of Waitstill Baxter (1913)
  • Penelope's Postscripts (1915)
  • Ladies in Waiting (1918)
  • The Romance of a Christmas Card (1919)
  • Homespun Tales (1920)
  • My Garden of Memory (1923) autobiography

Selected Resources

Carson, Rachel (1907 - 1964)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Rachael Carson -- biologist, environmentalist, nature writer, and crusader -- was born the youngest of three children in Springdale, PA (a small town near Pittsburgh) and she died in Silver Spring, MD. From the mid-1940s, she and her mother spent summers near West Southport, Maine and Carson built a summer cottage along Maine's Sheepscot River in 1952.

As a child, Carson was always interested in nature and being outside, but was also an avid reader and writer from an early age. In 1918, at the age of 10, she was published in the St. Nicholas Literary Magazine for children, with a story called "A Battle in the Clouds."

Carson attended the Pennsylvania College for Women at Pittsburgh (now Chatham College) on a small scholarship, majoring first in English, then switching to biology. She graduated magna cum laude in 1928. She attended a six-week summer session at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, MA, at Cape Cod, then went on to study genetics and marine zoology at Johns Hopkins University, where she received her M.A. in 1932 in marine zoology. She taught at Hopkins and at the University of Maryland for a few years, then joined what became the U. S. Fish & Wildlife Service in Washington, D.C., first as a part-time scriptwriter for a science radio show called "Romance Under the Seas." In 1936, she was hired as a junior aquatic biologist.

The Baltimore Sun published a series of her articles on various aspects of the sea -- written to supplement her teaching income -- and her first major publication, an article entitled "Undersea," was published in Atlantic Monthly in Sept. 1937. It had been developed by Carson as an introduction to the print brochures based on the "Romance Under the Seas" shows.

During WWII, Carson's responsibility at Fish & Wildlife was to promote fish as an alternative to foods in short supply because of the war. Between 1943 and 1945, she wrote four pamphlets describing over 70 fish and shellfish. Extremely successful, these booklets served as information sources for newspapers, magazines, and radio broadcasts throughout the country.

Carson served as editor-in-chief of the Fish and Wildlife Service's publications from 1949 to 1952, when she was able -- because of the success of her book The Sea Around Us -- to resign from the Service to devote more time to writing. For her contributions she was awarded the Distinguished Service Award by the Department of the Interior.

In the early 1950s, Carson became friends with Dorothy Murdoch Freeman (1898-1978) who was an administrator for the Massachusetts Department of Agricultural Services. Carson's Maine home was built near the home of Freeman and her family. The two women exchanged many letters over a twelve-year period, some of which are now published.

Silent Spring, her fourth book, was first serialised in The New Yorker and immediately drew the wrath of the chemical industry. Carson was accused of being a Communist by Velsicol Chemical Company, which threatened to sue her publisher. The New York Times review of the book, titled "There's Poison All Around Us Now," appeared on September 23, 1962. The controversy around the book -- which warned the public of the hazards of pesticide misuse and abuse -- led to a federal investigation into the misuse of pesticides and resulted in lengthy Congressional hearings in 1963.

Carson died in Spring 1964 of breast cancer that had been diagnosed in 1960. In 1980, Carson was posthumously awarded the highest civilian honor in the U.S., the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

The Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge, located in Wells, Maine -- a 4,600-acre refuge that stretches from Kittery to Cape Elizabeth -- was dedicated in June 1964 in her memory. The refuge consists primarily of coastal salt marsh with habitat for more than 250 bird and mammal species.

Selected Bibliography

  • Under the Sea Wind (1941)
  • The Sea Around Us (1951) received the National Book Award in 1952, among many other awards.
  • The Edge of the Sea (1955)
  • Silent Spring (1962)
  • The Sense of Wonder (published posthumously in 1965)
  • Always, Rachel: The Letters of Rachel Carson and Dorothy Freeman, 1952-1964 (1995) edited by Martha Freeman.

Selected Links

Carter, Isabel (1886 - 1976)

Genre: General Fiction

Born in Woolwich, Isabel Hopestill Carter was the second child of sea captain John Carter and his wife Clarissa (Reed) Carter. Isabel and her brothers and sister spent most of their childhood sailing aboard their father's vessels. In 1896 the family came ashore and purchased a home in Bath.

Isabel graduated from the then Bath High School in 1904 and then went to Wellesley College where she majored in math and Greek. After graduating in 1908, she earned a teaching certificate from Gorham Normal School, one of the precursors to the University of Southern Maine.

With the exception of three years, 1919 to 1921, when she did post-war relief work in Turkey, she was a teacher in both private and public high schools. Most of the time -- 1924 to 1927 and 1938 to 1953 -- she taught math at the Madeira School, McLean, Virginia.

Upon retirement, she and her mother returned to the family summer home in Yarmouth. She died in a Yarmouth nursing home in 1976.

Carter's publishing record -- one novel and six short stories -- belies her important role in understanding Maine's 19th-century maritime history. Although her work is fiction, the state's maritime historians recognize the authenticity of her characters and incidents that are based on her parents' experiences at sea. Carter's primary source for her novel and the six stories published in Atlantic Monthly and Woman's Home Companion between 1926 and 1929 were letters her parents wrote to each other between 1886 and 1896.

Selected Bibliography

  • Shipmates : a tale of the seafaring women of New England

Selected Resources

Cerullo, Mary (1949 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Children's book writer Mary Cerullo (born Sept. 6, 1949) has lived in Maine since 1981 and lives in South Portland.

She considers herself a 'science interpreter,' and she has worked for the University of Maine Sea Grant Program interpreting science for the public. She is associate director responsible for publications, public relations, and educational outreach at Friends of Casco Bay.

In addition to her books for children, she has also authored a teacher's handbook.

Selected Bibliography

Books for Children

  • Sharks: Challengers of the Deep (1993)
  • Lobsters: Gangsters of the Sea (1994)
  • Coral Reef: A City That Never Sleeps (1996)
  • Octopus: Phantom of the Sea (1997), a Lupine Award honor book)
  • Dolphins: What They Can Teach Us (1998)
  • Ocean Detectives: Solving the Mysteries of the Sea (1999), a Turnstone Ocean Explorer Book,
  • Hop Jump (1999)
  • The Truth About Great White Sharks (2000)
  • Sea Soup: Phytoplankton (1999)
  • Sea Soup: Zooplankton (2001)
  • Life Under Ice (2003, ill. Bill Curtsinger)
  • The Truth About Dangeous Sea Creatures (2003, photos by Jeffrey Rotman, illus. Michael Wertz)
  • Sea Turtles: Ocean Nomads (2003, photos by Jeffrey Rotman)
  • City Fish, Country Fish (2012) photos by Jeffrey L. Rotman

Books for Adults

  • Reading the Environment: Children's Literature in the Science Classroom, a teacher's handbook (1997)
  • Giant Squid: Searching for a Sea Monster (2012)

Selected Resources

Chapman, Janet (1956 - 2017)

Genre: Romance Novel

Romance author and lifetime Mainer, Janet Chapman was born in northern Maine and lived in a log home on a lake in Glenburn with her husband and sons.

Chapman's books are all set in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

Highlander series

  • Charming the Highlander (2003)
  • Loving the Highlander (2003)
  • Wedding the Highlander (2003)
  • Tempting the Highlander (2004)
  • Only With a Highlander (2005)
  • Secrets of the Highlander (2008)
  • A Highlander Christmas (2009)

Other titles

  • The Seductive Imposter (2004)
  • The Dangerous Protector (May 2005)
  • The Seduction of His Wife (2006)
  • Tempt me if you can (2010)
  • Spellbound Falls (2012)
  • Charmed by his Love (2012)
  • Call it Magic (2020)

Selected Resources

Chase, Mary Ellen (1887 - 1973)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Mary Ellen Chase was born on Feb. 24,1887 in Blue Hill,ME. She was a 1909 Univ. of Maine graduate, with a Ph.D. in English from the Univ. of Minnesota (1922), and honorary degrees from the Univ. of Maine (1928); Bowdoin (1933); Colby College (1937); Northeastern University (1947); and Smith College (1949).

Chase was a professor at the Univ. of Minnesota from 1922-1926, then at Smith College from 1926 until she retired in 1955.

She spent most of her adult life away from Maine but wrote of it with passion. She wrote novels, autobiographies, historical biographies, and books about writing and literature, as well as other non-fiction works.

In 1959 she received the Hale Award, given annually to a distinguished writer with a connection to New England. One of Chase's students at Smith College, Lee Kingman, herself an author and editor, won an essay contest sponsored by Vogue for a piece entitled 'Pamela's Socks and the Roman Emperors,' about her teacher.

Chase died in a nursing home in Northampton, Mass, on July 28, 1973.

Selected Bibliography

Children's Books

  • The Girl from the Big Horn Country (1916)
  • Virginia of Elk Creek Valley (1917)
  • Mary Christmas (1926)
  • The Silver Shell (1930) (ages 10-14)
  • It's All About Me (1937)
  • Donald McKay and the Clipper Ships (1959), juvenile biography
  • The Fishing Fleets of New England (1961), juvenile

Books for Adults

  • His Birthday (1915)
  • The Art of Narration (1926), with W. Frances K. Del Plaine
  • Uplands (1927)
  • Thomas Hardy from Serial to Novel (1927)
  • The Golden Asse and Other Essays (1929)
  • Constructive Theme Writing for College Freshmen (1929/1957)
  • A Goodly Heritage (1932)
  • Mary Peters (1934)
  • Silas Crockett (1935)
  • This England (1936)
  • Dawn in Lyonesse (1938)
  • A Goodly Fellowship (1939)
  • Windswept (1941)
  • The Bible and the Common Reader (1944)
  • Jonathan Fisher, Maine Parson, 1768-1847 (1948)
  • The Plum Tree (1949)
  • Abby Aldrich Rockefeller (1950)
  • Recipe for A Magic Childhood (1951)
  • The White Gate; Adventures in the Imagination of a Child (1954)
  • Life and Language in the Old Testament (1955)
  • The Edge of Darkness (1957)
  • Sailing the Seven Seas (1958)
  • The Lovely Ambition (1960)
  • The Psalms for the Common Reader (1962)
  • The Prophets for the Common Reader (1963)
  • Victoria: A Pig in a Pram (1963)
  • Dolly Moses: The Cat and the Clam Chowder (1964)
  • Richard Mansfield: The Prince of Donkeys (1964)
  • A Journey to Boston (1965)
  • The Story of Lighthouses (1965)
  • Values in Literature (1965), with Arno Jewett and William Evans
  • A Walk on an Iceberg (1966)

Selected Resources

Chetkowski, Emily (1957 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Emily Chetkowski is a children's book writer who lives in a farmhouse called Winn Farm in Westminster, MA most of the year. She summers on the island of Islesboro in Maine, where she does most of her writing.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mabel Takes the Ferry (1995/2001; illus. Dawn Peterson)
  • Amasa Walker's Splendid Garment (1996)
  • Mabel Takes A Sail (1999/2000; illus. Dawn Peterson)
  • Pumpkin Smile (2001; illus. Dawn Peterson),
  • Gooseman (2001; illus. Martha Armstrong)
  • Just a Kid: A Guard at the Nuremburg Trials (2004)
  • Sister Sluggers (2006)

Selected Resources

Chute, Carolyn (1947 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Born in Portland on June 14, 1947, current North Parsonsfield resident Carolyn Chute is known as much for her role in the 2nd Maine Militia, an organization dedicated to reducing government's role in our lives, as she is as a novelist.

A self-proclaimed redneck, Chute writes about the life and struggles of the rural poor living in the fictional town of Egypt, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

Fiction

  • The Beans of Egypt, Maine (1985)
  • Letourneau's Used Auto Parts (1988)
  • Merry Men (1994)
  • Snow Man (1999)
  • The School on Heart's Content Road (2008)
  • The Recipe for Revolution: A Novel (2020)

Non-Fiction

  • Up river : the story of a Maine fishing community (1996) photos by Olive Pierce

Selected Resources

Chute, Robert (1926 - 2021)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Robert Chute was born Feb. 13, 1926 in Bridgton, Maine and made his home in Poland, Maine.

He attended Bridgton High School and Fryeburg Academy, has a B.A. from the University of Maine (1950), and received his Doctor of Science from Johns Hopkins University in 1953. He has taught biology at Middlebury College, San Fernando Valley State College, and Lincoln University (PA) and is now Bates College Professor Emeritus of Biology, as well as director of the Bates-Morse Mountain Conservation Area, Phippsburg.

Chute was also a plumbing inspector and code enforcement officer in Mt. Vernon (ME) from 1976-1979.

Chute's scientific works focus on human ecology and culture's impact on lake and coastal ecosystems. He is also a poet whose poetry has frequently been published in the Beloit Poetry Journal. He was the fourth recipient of the journal's Chad Walsh Poetry Prize for his poem Heat Wave in Concord which was published in the Spring 1996 issue and focuses on Henry D. Thoreau's and a friend's cooling river escape from the heat. Chute's poem 'Sweeping the Skys,' won second prize in 1996 for the annual William and Kingman Page Chapbook Award granted by Potato Eyes Foundation, Troy, Maine.

Chute has written using the pseudonym L. W. Pond.

Selected Bibliography

Non-fiction

  • Environmental Insight: Readings and Comment on Human and Nonhuman Nature (1971)
  • Introductory Biology (1974) (later published as An Introduction to Biology in 1976)

Fiction

  • Roadside Rest: Another Maine Mystery from Wyman Falls (2012)

Poetry

  • Quiet Thunder: Poems from a Bates College Reading (1973)
  • The Uncle George Poems (1977)
  • Voices Great and Small (1977)
  • Thirteen Moons (1982), as three-language edition, which was published in French as Treize Lunes and in Passamaquoddy as 'Sanku Kisuhsok
  • Samuel Sewall Sails for Home: Poetry, Maine Arts Commission 1986 Chapbook Award winner
  • When Grandmother Decides to Die (1989)
  • Uncle George: Poems from a Maine Boyhood 1990)
  • Woodshed on the Moon: Thoreau Poems (1991)
  • Androscoggin Too: The Pejepscot Poems (1996)
  • Barely Time to Study Jesus: The Nat 'Turner' Revolt(1996).

Clampitt, Amy (1920 - 1994)

Genre: Poetry

Born in New Providence, Iowa, on June 15, 1920, and raised on a 125-acre farm, poet Amy Clampitt, considered one of the most distinguished 20th-century American poets, was a long-time Corea, Maine, summer visitor. A number of her poems contain subjects and images influenced by the area's natural beauty.

Clampitt earned a B.A. at Grinnell College (with honors, 1941) and also studied at Columbia University and the New School for Social Research. She worked at Oxford University Press from 1943 to 1951 as secretary and writer, as reference librarian at the National Audubon Society (1952 to 1959), and as a freelance writer, editor, and researcher during the 1960s and 1970s, then spent five years (1977 to 1982) as an editor at E. P. Dutton.

She first attempted to write novels and then turned to poetry in the 1960s. In 1978 her work appeared for the first time in the New Yorker.

In addition to being a noted poet, Clampitt was also a well-respected teacher. She was a College of William & Mary writer-in-residence, Amherst College visiting writer and also a visiting writer at Smith College. Her awards include a Guggenheim Fellowship, an Academy of American Poets Fellowship, and she was a MacArthur Prize Fellow in 1992.

Clampitt died at her home in Lenox, Massachusetts, in Sept. 1994.

Selected Bibliography

  • Multitudes, Multitudes (1974)
  • The Kingfisher (1983)
  • The Summer Solstice(1983)
  • The Isthmus (1981) limited edition
  • A Homage to John Keats (1984) limited edition
  • What the Light Was Like (1985)
  • Archaic Figure (1987)
  • The Essential Donne (1988) author of introduction
  • Westward: Poems (1990)
  • Manhattan: An Elegy, and Other Poems (1990)
  • Predecessors, Et Cetera: Essays (1991)
  • A Silence Opens: Poems (1994)
  • The Collected Poems of Amy Clampitt (1997)

Selected Resources

Clark, William (1913 - 1988)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Born in Caratunk, Maine, Bill Clark was a columnist for the Portland Press Herald. Many of his columns and books focused on the fictional town of Cedar River and its inhabitants.

Selected Bibliography

  • Tales of Cedar River (1960)
  • More Tales of Cedar River (1961)
  • Maine Is In My Heart (1964)
  • From Thought to Theme (1965)
  • The Best of Bill Clark: 1957-1967 (1967)
  • Sing Peace to Cedar River (1982)
  • The Hills of Maine and Other Stories (1990)
  • Down East Humor (1973)

Clarke, Rebecca (1833 - 1906)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction

Rebecca Clarke, considered America's first writer for children because she wrote for children and not for small adults, was born in Norridgewock on Feb. 22, 1833. She lived there most of her life, except for a 10-year period from 1851-1861 when she was a school teacher in Indiana. She also wintered in Baltimore, Florida, and California.

Clarke's first story was sold to the Memphis Daily Appeal, written under the pseudonym 'Sophie May.' Subsequent stories were sold to Little Pilgrim, Boston Congregationalist, and Merry's Museum.

Clarke purchased and donated the building for the first Norridgewock public library shortly before her death, on Aug. 16, 1906.

Selected Bibliography

Adult Books

  • Drone's Honey (1887)
  • Pauline Wyman (1897)

Cildren's Books (written under the pen name Sophie May)

Little Prudy Series:

  • Little Prudy (1864)
  • Sister Susy (1864)
  • Captain Horace (1864)
  • Cousin Grace (1865)
  • Fairy Book (1865)
  • Dotty Dimple (1868)

Dottie Dimple Series:

  • Dotty Dimple at Her Grandmother's (1868)
  • Dotty Dimple Out West (1868)
  • Dotty Dimple at Home (1868)
  • Dotty Dimple at Play (1869)
  • Dotty Dimple at School (1869)
  • Dotty Dimple Flyaway (1869)

Little Prudy's Flyaway:

  • Little Folks Astray (1870)
  • Prudy Keeping House (1870)
  • Aunt Madge's Story (1871)
  • Little Grandmother (1872)
  • Little Grandfather (1873)
  • Miss Thistledown (1873)

Flaxie Frizzle:

  • Flaxie Frizzle (1876)
  • Doctor Papa (1877)
  • Little Pitchers (1878)
  • Twin Cousins (1880)
  • Flaxie's Kittyleen (1883) also called simply Kittyleen
  • Flaxie Growing Up (1884)

Little Prudy's Children:

  • Wee Lucy (1894)
  • Jimmy Boy (1895)
  • Kyzie Dunlee (1895)
  • Wee Lucy's Secret (1899)
  • Jimmy, Lucy, and All (1900)
  • Lucy in Fairyland (1901)

Quinnebasset Girls:

  • Doctor's Daughter (1871)
  • Our Helen (1874)
  • Asbury Twins (1875)
  • Quinnebasset Girls (1877)
  • Janet (1882)
  • In Old Quinnebasset (1891)
  • Joy Bells (1903)

Non-Series (for Children?)

  • The Campion Diamonds (1897)

Selected Resources

  • Jeff Hollingsworth's Magnificent Mainers (1995) includes a short section on Clarke
  • Dictionary of Literary Biography, Volume 42: American Writers for Children Before 1900 (1985) has a long biographical section about her.
  • Rebecca Clarke texts at Project Gutenberg

Clifford, Harold (1893 - 1987)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Harold Clifford was born in Winthrop and received his B.A. from Bates College. He was principal of Alfred High School from 1912-13 and 1916-17 and Superintendent of schools, including those in the Boothbay area, from 1917 to 1956.

The community playground in Boothbay is named for Clifford, as is the Boothbay Region High School's annual book award. Clifford wrote the history of the Boothbay Harbor Rotary Club from its inception in the 1930s to 1987, with Chip Griffin completing the history to 1999; the history is dedicated to Clifford in appreciation "of the vibrant tone of both his piano playing and his words."

Clifford wrote history books for adults and children about Maine and New England.

Selected Bibliography

Books for Adults

  • Maine and Her People (1958)
  • Boothbay Region 1906 to 1960 (1961)
  • You and Your Job in Maine (1964)
  • Charlie York: Maine Coast Fisherman (1974)

Juvenile Books

  • America, My Home Then and Now (1939)
  • Canada, My Neighbor (1944)
  • Yesterday in America (1949)
  • American Leaders (1953)
  • Exploring New England (1961)
  • Sea Horse: A Shetland Pony Comes to Monhegan (1987)
  • Clear Sailing (1987).

Coatsworth, Elizabeth (1893 - 1986)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Coatsworth, born in Buffalo, NY and a graduate of Vassar (BA 1915) and Columbia (MA 1916), was the wife of Henry Beston (married 1929) and lived with him in Hingham, MA, then for decades on a farm in Nobleboro; she's buried in the cemetery on Chimney Farm. Their daughter -- Kate Barnes -- was Maine's first poet laureate.

Coatsworth traveled widely, spending time in England, France, Spain, Italy, Greece, Egypt, Morocco, Japan, China, Mexico, the Philippines, and the Yucatan. She incorporated her travel memories into her writing.

Selected Bibliography

Juvenile Works

  • The Cat and the Captain (1927)
  • Toutou in Bondage (1929)
  • The Boy With the Parrot (1929)
  • Away Goes Sally (1934)
  • Sword of the Wilderness (1936)
  • Alice-All-By-Herself (1937)
  • Five Bushel Farm (1939) companion to Away Goes Sally
  • Houseboat Summer (1942)
  • Thief Island (1943)
  • The Little Haymakers (1949), the story of a boy and his pair of oxen
  • The Captain's Daughter (1950)
  • The Enchanted: An Incredible Tale (1951)
  • Dollar for Luck (1951)
  • Silky: An Incredible Tale (1953)
  • Door to the North, A Saga of 14th Century America (1952)
  • Giant Book of Cat Stories (1953)
  • Old Whirlwind: A Davy Crockett Story (1953/1964)
  • Mountain Bride (1954)
  • The Last Fort, A Story of the French Voyageurs (1958)
  • The Peaceable Kingdom and Other Poems (1958)
  • The Nobel Doll (1961)
  • Bob Bodden and the Goodship Rover (1968)
  • The White Room: An Incredible Tale (1958)
  • The Sailing Hatrack (1972)
  • Marra's World (1975)
  • The Cat Who Went To Heaven (1930) 1931 Newbery Award

Adult Works

  • Here I Stay: A Maine Novel (1938)
  • Maine Memories: Vignettes of Life around Damariscotta (1944)
  • Personal Geography: Almost an Autobiography (1976)
  • Maine Ways (1945)

Poetry

  • Country Poems (1942)
  • Summer Green (1948)
  • Fox Footprints (1923)
  • Atlas and Beyond (1924)
  • Compass Rose (1929)
  • Country Poems (1942)
  • Summer Green (1948)
  • Sung under the Silver Umbrella: Poems for Young Children (1935)

Selected Resources

Coffin, Robert (1892 - 1955)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Born in Brunswick, a 1915 graduate of Bowdoin, and later a professor there (1934-1955), essayist, poet, and novelist Robert Peter Tristam Coffin won the 1936 Pulitzer Prize in poetry for Strange Holiness.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry

  • Christchurch (1924)
  • Dew & Bronze (1927)
  • Golden Falcon (1929)
  • The Yoke of Thunder (1932)
  • Ballads of Square-Toed Americans (1933)
  • Strange Holiness (1935) Pulitzer Prize Winner
  • Fifteen Girls on a Hobby Horse (1937)
  • Maine Ballads (1938)
  • There Will Be Bread and Love (1942)
  • Poem for a Son with Wings (1945)
  • People Behave Like Ballads (1946)
  • Collected Poems (1948)
  • The Third Hunger and the Poem Aloud (1949)
  • Selected Poems (1955)

Essays

  • Book of Crowns and Cottages (1925)
  • An Attic Room (1929)
  • New Poetry of New England: Frost & Robinson (1938) lectures
  • The Substance That Is Poetry (1942)
  • Book of Uncles (1944)
  • Maine Doings: Informal Essays (1950)
  • On the Green Carpet (1951)
  • Mainstays of Maine (1944)

Novels

  • Red Sky in the Morning (1935)
  • John Dawn (1936)
  • Thomas, Thomas -- Ancil Thomas (1941)

Biographies and other Non-Fiction

  • The Dukes of Buckingham (1931)
  • Lost Paradise: A Boyhood on a Maine Coast Farm (1934)
  • Portrait of an American (1935)
  • Kennebec: Cradle of Americans (1937)
  • Captain Abby and Captain John (1939)
  • Christmas in Maine (1948)
  • Do You Know Maine? (1948)
  • Life in America: New England (1951)

Selected Resources

Cohen, William (1940 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

William S. (Bill) Cohen was born in Bangor, the son of a Jewish father -- a baker -- and an Irish Protestant mother.

He received an A.B. in Latin from Bowdoin College in 1962 and an LL.B cum laude from Boston University Law School in 1965. Cohen was a star basketball player in both high school and college.

Following his formal education, Cohen became an attorney with a Bangor law firm and Assistant County Attorney for Penobscot County from 1968-1970. He was vice president of the Maine Trial Lawyers Association from 1970-1972, entering public life as a city councilor in Bangor (1969-1972), also serving as Bangor's mayor from 1971-1972. He served as a Republican in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1972-1978, then was elected to the U.S. Senate, where he served until he announced his retirement after 3 terms in early 1996. Democratic President Clinton appointed Cohen as his Secretary of Defense in 1997, a position he held until 2001.

Cohen married Janet Langhart Cohen on Valentine's Day 1996; she was a former runway model and a seasoned television journalist who worked as a Boston newscaster and as correspondent for Entertainment Tonight and Black Entertainment Television.

Cohen has written poetry, suspense, and non-fiction.

Selected bibliography

Fiction

  • The Double Man (1985) with Senator Gary Hart
  • One-Eyed Kings (1991)
  • Murder in the Senate (1993)with Thomas B. Allen
  • Dragon fire 2006

Non-Fiction

  • Roll Call: One Year in the United States Senate (1981)
  • Getting the Most Out of Washington: Using Congress to Move the Federal Bureaucracy (1982)
  • Men of Zeal: A Candid Inside Story of the Iran Contra Hearings (1988) with Senator George Mitchell
  • Easy Prey: The Fleecing of America's Senior Citizens and How to Stop It (1995)
  • Love in black and white : a memoir of race, religion, and romance (2007)

Poetry

  • Of Sons and Seasons (1978)
  • A Baker's Nickel (1986)

Selected Resources

Colcord, Joanna (1882 - 1960)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Joanna Carver Colcord, a descendant of Searsport seafarers, was born at sea on March 18, 1882, somewhere between New South Wales and Yokohama, Japan. She and her brother Lincoln were well-educated both on shipboard and in Searsport.

She majored in chemistry at University of Maine at Orono, receiving bachelor's and master's degrees by 1909. After some restlessness, she continued her education at the New York School of Philanthropy -- later called the School for Social Work -- earning a certificate in 1911. For over 30 years following, she distinguished herself as a social worker, publishing a number of works. During the Depression she was a strong advocate for some type of social security and health insurance.

Her lifelong love of the sea inspired other titles as well.

Selected Bibliography

  • Broken Homes: A Study of Family Desertion and Its Social Treatment (1919)
  • Roll and Go: Songs of American Sailormen (1924)
  • The Long View; Papers and Addresses by Mary E. Richmond (1930)
  • Community Planning in Unemployment Emergencies: Recommendations Growing Out of Experience (1930)
  • Setting up a Program of Work Relief (1931)
  • Emergency Work Relief, As Carried Out in Twenty-Six American Communities, 1930-1931 (1932)
  • Community Programs for Subsistence Gardens (1933) with Mary Johnston
  • Cash Relief (1936)
  • Songs of American Sailormen (1938)
  • Sea Language Comes Ashore (1945)

Selected Resources

Colcord, Lincoln (1883 - 1947)

Genre: General Fiction

Though technically born on a ship that was rounding Cape Horn on its way to China, Colcord's home was Searsport, Maine. He came from five generations of sea-faring men and it's not surprising that he wrote about the sea. Colcord graduated from Univ. of Maine in 1905 and was a Washington correspondent for the Philadelphia Ledger around the time of the first World War.

Selected Bibliography

  • Vision of War, (1915) a 150-page poem that was Colcord's most famous work
  • The Drifting Diamond,(1912),
  • The Game of Life and Death: Stories of the Sea,(1914), and
  • An Instrument of the Gods, and other stories of the sea,(1922/1972).

Story collection

  • Sea Stories from Searsport to Singapore: Selections of Lincoln Colcord (1987)

Other works

  • Giants in the Earth, a Saga of the Prairies, by O.E. Rolvaag (1927) a translation
  • Sailing Days on the Penobscot... (1932) for 's - Who Rules America: A Century of Invisible Government by John McConaughy (1934), wrote the appendix
  • Roll and Go by Joanna Colcord(1924) wrote the introduction, the author was his sister

Selected Resources

A book on both Joanna and Lincoln Colcord was published in 1999, entitled: - Letters from Sea, 1882-1901: Joanna and Lincoln Colcord's Seafaring Childhood by Parker Bishop Albee. - Maine Authors: a Collection of Clippings from the Portland Sunday Telegram - Maine Author Scrapbooks : a Collection of Newspaper Clippings Vol. 2

Cole, John (1923 - 2003)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Cole grew up on Long Island (NY), served with the Army Air Corps during World War II (flying 35 combat missions over Europe), and graduated from Yale University (1945).

He lived and worked in Manhattan before moving to Maine in the 1950s, where he lived the rest of his life, apart from a 6-year interlude in Key West.

Cole was well known in Maine, both for his career in journalism and his positions on political and environmental issues. He was the founding editor in 1968 (with Peter Cox) of the Maine Times, and was editor of Maine In Print, the newspaper of the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance. He also edited the Kennebunk Star and the Brunswick Times-Record for which he wrote a regular column.

Besides writing a number of books, he published essays and articles in many publications including: Atlantic Monthly, Field & Stream, Country Journal, Harper's, cite>Esquire, Portland magazine, and Maine Biz.

He also taught journalism classes at Bowdoin.

Some of Cole's awards include the Distinguished Flying Cross for military service, and the Yankee Quill Award from the Academy of New England Journalists, the Associated Press Award for Best Political Reporting, the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Natural Resources Council of Maine and the Outdoor Life Award for Environmental Writing, presented by President Jimmy Carter.

Cole died in Brunswick, Maine, on 8 January 2003 at the age of 79.

Selected Bibliography

  • In Maine: 'of All the Winds That Blow I Like the Northwest Best ...',(1974) reissued with new essays in 2001
  • From the Ground Up,(1976) detailed plans for ecologically friendly home projects, written in cooperation with the Shelter Institute in Bath
  • Striper: The Story of Fish and Man, (1978/1989)
  • Sun Reflections: Images for the New Solar Age (1981)
  • Breaking New Ground(1986) with Charles Wing, about house building
  • Fishing Came First: A Memoir(1989/1991/1997)
  • Tarpon Quest(1991/1998)
  • Claremont Hotel, Southwest Harbor, Maine: A Landmark's Narrative History (1994)
  • Away All Boats: A Personal Guide for the Small-Boat Owner (1994)
  • Life List: Remembering the Birds of My Years(1997)
  • Maine Trivia(1998)
  • Fly Fishing for Saltwater's Finest: How to Catch the 10 Best Sport Fish at Premier Inshore Sites (2000)with Brad Burns

Selected Resources

Coleman, Eliot (1939 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Eliot Coleman grew up in Redbank, New Jersey, and has lived in Colorado, Massachusetts, and Vermont.

In 1968, after reading Scott and Helen Nearing's book The Good Life, Coleman bought 60 acres of Scott Nearing's land in Harborside, Cape Rosier, near Brooksville, Maine.

Coleman made his living for the next two decades working on other organic farms, including, in the late 1970's,the experimental Coolidge Center in Massachusetts, where Coleman developed the idea of using cold frames inside hoop houses to extend the growing season, and in the early 1980s at the Mountain School in Vermont, where he directed the farm program.

He also traveled in Europe in the mid-1970s when he was working on his graduate degree in Spanish literature, and while there toured organic farms.

In the early 1990s he bought back the land at Harborside, and he and his third wife, Barbara Damrosch, have lived there since, earning much of their livelihood by selling the organic produce they raise from October to May each year at Four Season Farm.

Coleman and Damrosch were featured in the Sept/Oct. 1998 issue of Hope. Coleman has been a keynote conference speaker at Northeast Organic Farming Association. The couple also answered gardening questions in American Homestyle and Gardening magazine for several years, and they both give numerous gardening talks.

Coleman is known as an innovator in farming systems and tools, and has written several gardening books.

Selected Bibliography

  • The New Organic Grower: A Master Manual of Tools and Techniques for the Home and Market Gardener, (1989/1995)
  • The New Organic Gardener's Four Season Harvest: How To Harvest Fresh Organic Vegetables From Your Home Garden All Year Long, (1992)
  • Four Season Harvest: How to Harvest Fresh Organic Vegetables From Your Home Garden All Year Round),(1999)
  • The Winter Harvest Manual: Farming the Backside of the Calendar, (1999) with Barbara Damrosch,

Coleman, Loren (1947 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Loren Coleman was raised in Decatur, Illinois, and received his undergraduate degree in anthropology-zoology and his graduate degree in psychiatric social work.

He settled in New England in 1975, bought a cabin in Rangeley in 1980, and moved to Portland in 1983, where he has lived since, and where he has opened the International Cryptozoology Museumm.

Coleman has been visiting assistant professor of social work at the University of New England, and was, for thirteen years, a senior research associate at the Edmund S. Muskie School of Public Policy, University of Southern Maine; he was adjunct associate professor at the University of Southern Maine from 1989-2003.

Coleman's first article -- Mystery Animals in Illinois -- was published in March 1969 when he was 21. Since then, he has written over 200 articles, been a consultant to a number of reality-based TV shows (including "Unsolved Mysteries") and The History Channel's "In Search of History," and he writes a regular cryptozoology column for Fate Magazineas well as frequent articles for the London-based Fortean Magazine; he has also written for Mysteries Magazine and The Anomalist.

He is also a frequent guest on radio shows to discuss both his cryptozoology books and his books on human behavior -- contagion and suicide clusters. Coleman speaks to children's groups, libraries, and other civic groups worldwide.

Though best known for his books and articles on cryptozoology, Coleman has written or edited several books on suicide prevention and copycats, including The Copycat Effect: How the Media and Popular Culture Trigger the Mayhem in Tomorrow's Headlines (2004).

His work on the suicides of baseball players was heavily covered in the media, including in Sports Illustrated and on ESPN.

Coleman has also developed several curricula on the topic. He was director of the Runaway Suicide Prevention Project at USM, and has been involved with the Maine Governor's Youth Suicide Prevention Initiative, having trained some 1,000 Mainers since 1998.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Unidentified (1975) with Jerome Clark
  • Creatures of the Outer Edge (1978) with Jerome Clark)
  • Mysterious America (1983)
  • Curious Encounters (1985)
  • Suicide Clusters (1987)
  • Tom Slick and the Search for the Yeti (1989)
  • The Field Guide to Bigfoot, Yeti, and Other Mystery Primates Worldwide (1999) with Patrick Huyghe
  • Cryptozoology A to Z: The Encyclopedia of Loch Monsters, Sasquatch, Chupacabras, and Other Authentic Mysteries of Nature (1999) with Jerome Clark

Selected Resources

Elder, Elizabeth ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Elizabeth Elder, who lives in Cape Elizabeth, is a poet, short story writer, and the author of two children's books. A Skidmore College alumna (1967) with a number of Maine newspapers, including as editor of South Portland Sentry and The Coastal Journal (Bath/Brunswick), as features editor of The Times Record (Brunswick), as a reporter for the Boothbay Register and as correspondent for Kennebec Journal (Augusta).

Selected Bibliography

  • Watching a River Freeze: Selections from Coastal Maine (2000), a collection of short stories set in Maine
  • Considering Louis: Mathematically Possible Poems (2000), poetry for children
  • Christmas with Alice-Ems (2000)
  • When I'm With You (2003), a children's picture book, illustrated by Leslie Mansmann of North Yarmouth.

Colwell, Miriam (1917 - 2014)

Genre: General Fiction

Born in Prospect Harbor, Miriam Colwell lived with her maternal grandparents as her mother died when Miriam was a toddler and her father was ill with tuberculosis. She graduated from Winter Harbor High School and then attended the University of Maine, Orono, majoring in English. She left before graduating to live in New York where she was a freelance and advertising copywriter. She returned to Prospect Harbor in 1940 and became the town's postmaster; her grandfather had held the position but had been forced to leave when he reached the mandatory retirement age. Colwell was 23 and the youngest postmaster in the United States.

Selected Bibliography

  • Wind Off the Water (1945)
  • Day of the Trumpet (1947)
  • Young (1955)
  • Contentment Cove (2006)

Selected Resources

Compton, David (1941 - 2007)

Genre: General Fiction

David Compton was born in Bronxville, New York, in 1941 and raised in the midwest, moving to Rhode Island in 1954. He received a bachelor's degree in French from Bates (1963), and a master's from Brown. For more than 30 years he taught French and English at private schools in New England. He and his wife retired to Buckfield.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Filthy Business, (2002)
  • Nexus, (2004)
  • Claxton Hall, (2005)
  • Catalyst, (2006)

Conforti, Jopseph (1945 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Joe Conforti is known for his scholarship on New England history and culture. He was the founder and ten-year director of the University of Southern Maine's American and New England Studies graduate program. A native of Fall River, Mass., Conforti earned M.A. (1972) and Ph.D. (1975) at Brown University.

Selected Bibliography

  • Saints and Strangers: New England in British North America, (2006)
  • Creating Portland: History and Place in Northern New England, (2005), editor
  • Imagining New England: Explorations of Regional Identity From the Pilgrims to the Mid-Twentieth Century, (2001), which received the 2002 Northeast Popular Culture/American Culture Association Book Award

Selected Resources

University of Southern Maine, American and New England Studies Program

Conkling, Philip (1950 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Philip Conkling, a Rockport resident since 1984, is the co-founder, with Peter Ralston, of the Island Institute. Based in Rockland, the organization's purpose is to protect and promote the balanced use of Maine's islands. Conkling is also the editor of the institute's yearly publication, Island Journal.

Before establishing the institute, Conkling was a forester and co-authored a number of research reports for the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Forest Service.

Selected Bibliography

  • Lobsters, Great & Small: How Scientists and Fishermen are Changing our Understanding of a Maine Icon, (2002)
  • Islands in Time: a Natural and Cultural History of the Islands of the Gulf of Maine, (1999)
  • From Cape Cod to the Bay of Fundy: an Environmental Atlas of the Gulf of Maine, (1995), editor
  • People and Islands: Resource Management Issues for Islands in the Gulf of Maine, (1984), with W.H. Drury and R.E. Leonard
  • Green Islands, Green Sea: a Guide to Foraging on the Islands of Maine, (1980)

Selected Resources

Island Institute

Connellan, Leo (1928 - 2001)

Genre: Poetry

Leo Connellan was born near Portland and grew up in Rockland. He attended the University of Maine for three years prior to joining the Army, then on to Greenwich Village in the 1950's to be a part of the Beat Generation. His poetry concerns itself with the human condition, and was also highly influenced by his early proximity to the fishing and lobstering industry in Maine.

Following his stint in New York, he and wife Nancy moved to Clinton, Connecticut, where he worked as a typewriter ribbon salesman for many years and continued to write poetry. When he won the Shelley Memorial Award for Poetry in 1983, he gained enough recognition that he was able to work as a teacher.

He worked as poet-in-residence at Connecticut State University from 1988 to 2001, and was named Connecticut Poet Laureate from 1996 on. Mr. Connellan received an honorary doctorate from the University of Maine at Augusta in 1998.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Poems, (1999)
  • Short Poems, City Poems, 1944-1998, (1998)
  • Provincetown, and Other Poems, (1995)
  • New and Collected Poems, (1989)
  • The Clear Blue Lobster-Water Country: a Trilogy, (1985)
  • Shatterhouse, (1983)
  • First Selected Poems, (1976)
  • Crossing America, (1976)

Selected Resources

Coomer, Joe (1958 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

A Texas native, raised in Kentucky, novelist Joe Coomer still lives in Texas most of the year but summers in Stonington, ME, and sails along the Maine coast. He has also written nonfiction. Coomer attended the University of Kentucky and graduated from Southern Methodist University in 1981. He taught creative writing in New Mexico.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Decatur Road: A Novel of the Appalachian Country,(1983) winner of the Jones Fiction Prize from the Texas Institute of Letters.
  • Pocketful of Names, (2005)
  • One Vacant Chair, (2003), winner of the S. Mariella Gable Prize
  • Apologizing to Dogs, (1999)
  • Beachcombing For a Shipwrecked God, (1997)
  • Sailing in a Spoonful of Water, (1997)
  • The Loop, (1992, New York Times Book of the Year, 1993

Cooney, Barbara (1917 - 2000)

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Barbara Cooney was born in Brooklyn, summered as a child on the Maine coast, received her art degree from Smith College (BA 1938). Until her death in March, 2000 she lived in Damariscotta with her husband, Charles Talbot Porter; their four children are grown. Cooney won two Caldecott Medals, an American Book Award, received the University of Maine's Maryann Hartman Award in 1998, and was recognized by Gov. Angus King as a 'Maine State Treasure.' Cooney illustrated over 105 children's books, 18 of which she also authored.

The Lupine Award for outstanding contribution to children's literature of Maine given by the Maine Library Association derives its name from Cooney's book Miss Rumphius.

Selected Bibliography

Both Written and Illustrated:

  • King of Wreck Island (1941)
  • Chanticleer and the Fox (1958; adapted from Chaucer) Caldecott winner
  • Miss Rumphius (1982)The of a woman who as a little girl loved the sea, longed to visit faraway places and wished to do something to make the world more beautiful. Winner of American Book Award
  • Hattie and the Wild Waves: A Story from Brooklyn (1990)
  • Eleanor (1996) about Eleanor Roosevelt's childhood
  • Island Boy (1999)

Illustrated Only:

  • American Folk Songs for Children in Home, School, and Nursery School (1948) compiled by Ruth Seeger
  • Kildee House (1949) by Rutherford Montgomery; Newbery Honor Roll
  • Christmas in the Barn (1952) by Margaret Wise Brown
  • Yours With Love, Kate (1952) by Miriam Mason, about Kate Douglas Wiggin
  • Five Little Peppers and How The Grew (1954) by Margaret Sidney
  • Peacock Pie (1961) by Walter de la Mare
  • A White Heron: A Story of Maine (1963) by Sarah Orne Jewett
  • The Owl and the Pussycat (1969) by Edward Lear
  • Lexington and Concord 1775: What Really Happened (1975) by Jean Colby
  • Ox-Cart Man (1979) by Donald Hall Caldecott winner
  • Where Have You Been? (1981) by Margaret Wise Brown
  • The Story of Holly and Ivy (1985) by Rumer Godden
  • The Year of the Perfect Christmas Tree: An Appalachian Story (1988) by Gloria Houston
  • Basket Moon (1999) by Mary Lyn Ray

Selected Resources

Easton, Thomas (1945 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Science Fiction/Fantasy

Tom Easton is a theoretical biologist, science-fiction and textbook writer, book reviewer, and professor at Thomas College in Waterville, Maine. He earned his B.A. in biology at Colby College (1966) and a Ph.D. in theoretical biology at the University of Chicago (1972). His family is from Lincolnville; Easton lives now in Belfast and enjoys trout-fishing, wine-making, gardening, and snow-shoeing.

He has published articles in Astronomy, Consumer Reports, Tomorrowsf and Analog.

Selected Bibliogrpahy

Non-Fiction

  • Bioscope (1984, with Carl E. Rischer)
  • Careers in Science (1985/2004 - 4th ed.)
  • Working for Life: Careers in Biology (1987)
  • Focus on Human Biology (1994/1997; with Carl E. Rischer)
  • Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Controversial Environmental Issues (2003/2005/2006 - 12th ed.; with Theodore D Goldfarb)
  • Periodic Stars: An Overview of Science Fiction Literature in the 1980s and 1990s (1997)

Fiction - Organic Futures Series

  • Sparrowhawk (1990)
  • Greenhouse (1991)
  • Woodsman (1992)
  • Tower of the Gods (1993)
  • Seeds of Destiny (1994)

Fiction - Other

  • Silicon Karma (1997)
  • Frontiers of Wonder (1999)
  • Bigfoot Stalks the Coast of Maine: And Other Twisted Downeast Tales (2000/2003), science fiction spoof
  • Unto the Last Generation (2000)
  • The Electric Gene Machine (2000; collection of Easton's stories about the future of genetic engineering)
  • The Great Flying Saucer Conspiracy (2002), science fiction
  • Stones of Memory (2003), science fiction about an eco-catastrophe; sequel to Unto the Last Generation
  • Firefight (2003), eco-science fiction

Selected Resources

-Easton's web site

Eckstorm, Fannie (1865 - 1946)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Eckstorm, both author and ornithologist, was born Fannie Pearson Hardy in Brewer, Maine, and graduated from Smith College in 1888. At Smith, she founded the college Audubon Society. She was for a short time (1889-1891) superintendent of schools in Brewer, the first woman to hold such a position in Maine. She then briefly worked as a reader for Boston's DC Heath publishing company. She married the Rev. Jacob A. Eckstorm of Chicago in 1893, and they moved to Eastport, Maine. In 1898, the Eckstorms moved to a pastorate in Providence, RI, where Fannie was widowed in 1899. Eckstorm and her two children moved back to Brewer following her husband's death.

She contributed articles to Bird-Lore and the Auk, before publishing her first two books in 1901. Eckstorm founded Brewer's public library in 1908 and was active in the suffragette movement and in Republican politics. Her books and articles were often concerned with the Penobscot Valley of Maine. Besides her books below, Eckstorm also wrote a widely note critique on Thoreau's Maine Woods (1908), contributed to Louis C. Hatch's Maine: A History (1919), and wrote articles on Indian legends.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Bird Book (1901; children's book)
  • The Woodpeckers (1901)
  • The Penobscot Man (1904)
  • David Libbey: Penobscot Woodman and River Driver (1907)
  • Indian Legends of Mt. Katahdin (1924)
  • The Katahdin Legends (1924)
  • Minstrely of Maine: Folk Songs and Ballads of the Woods and the Coast, with Mary Winslow Smyth (1927)
  • British Ballads from Maine: The Development of Popular Songs with Texts and Airs, with Phillips Barry and Mary Winslow Smyth (1929)
  • The Handicrafts of the Modern Indians of Maine (1932)
  • The Attack on Norridgewock, 1724 (1934)
  • Jeremiah Pearson Hardy: A Maine Portrait Painter (1939)
  • Maine Maps of Historical Interest (1939)
  • Two Maine Texts of Lamkin (1939)
  • Who Was Paugus? (1939)
  • Indian Place Names of the Penobscot Valley and the Maine Coast (1941)
  • Correspondence, 1941-43
  • Old John Neptune and Other Maine Indian Shamans (1945)
  • Down the West Branch of the Penobscot, August 12-22, 1889 (1949)
  • A Handful of Spice: A Miscellany of Maine Literature and History (1968)
  • Tales of the Maine Woods: Two Forest & Stream Essays (1891)

Selected Resources

Elwell, Edward (1825 - 1890)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Born in Portland, Edward H. Elwell was a journalist and writer. Joseph Griffin in The Press of Maine (1872) wrote that in 1848 Elwell and Edwin Plummer started publishing the Northern Pioneer, a weekly literary paper. In the same year Elwell and some other investors then combined the Northern Pioneer with the Transcript. Elwell was also one of the newly created newspaper's editors.

Selected Bibliography

  • Aroostook: With Some Account of the Excursions Thither of the Editors of Maine, in the Years 1858 and 1878, and of the Colony of Swedes, Settled in the Town of New Sweden (1878).In 1858 and in a follow-up trip in 1878 Elwell reported on the observations of a group of newspaper men who had visited Aroostook County to promote people moving there. Elwell makes negative statements about the St. John Valley French settlers.
  • Fraternity Papers (1886), a collection of ten papers he presented at the Portland Fraternity Club
  • The Boys of Thirty-Five, A Story of a Seaport Town (1884) a novel
  • John S.C. Abbott's The History of Maine (1892). second edition five new chapters
  • Portland and Vicinity (1876), an illustrated guide to the Portland area, was re-issued in a facsimile edition by Greater Portland Landmarks in 1975.

Damrosch, Barbara (1942 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Barbara Damrosch is a professional landscape gardener, and has worked in horticulture since 1977. She writes, consults and speaks on gardening and farming, and co-owns Four Season Farm with husband Eliot Coleman in Harborside, ME.

She writes a weekly column, A Cook's Garden, for the Washington Post. During the 1991 and 1992 seasons she appeared regularly on the PBS series Victory Garden, and had a 10-year run as co-host of Gardening Naturally on the Learning Channel, from 1993 to 2003.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Garden Primer, (2008), updated from 1988
  • Theme Gardens, (2001), updated from 1982
  • The Four Season Farm Gardener's Cookbook: From the Garden to the Table in 120 Recipes (2013)

Emerson, Kathy (1947 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Mystery, Non-Fiction, Romance Novel

Emerson, born in rural Liberty, New York, lives in Wilton, Maine, and has written over 20 historical and contemporary romances, historical mysteries, children's books, and non-fiction works of history. She has a B.A. from Bates College and an M.A. from Old Dominion University (Virginia). She's an active member of Sisters in Crime. SEE ALSO Kate Emerson, Kaitlyn DunnettKaitlyn Gorton

Selected Bibliography

Historical Romance

  • Winter Tapestry (1991)
  • Firebrand (1993)
  • Unquiet Hearts (1994)
  • The Green Rose (1994)

Secrets of the Tudor Court Series (written as Kate Emerson)

  • Secrets of the Tudor Court: The Pleasure Palace (2009)
  • Secrets of the Tudor Court: Between Two Queens (2010)
  • Secrets of the Tudor Court: By Royal Decree (2010)

Contemporary Romance

  • Cloud Castles (1989)
  • Echoes and Illusions (1993)
  • Hearth, Home and Hope (1995)
  • Love Thy Neighbor (1997)
  • Separated Sisters (1997)
  • Sleepwalking Beauty (1997)
  • Relative Strangers (1997)
  • Sight Unseen (1998)
  • Tried and True (1998)
  • That Special Smile (1998; Loveswept #913)

Face Down Historical Mystery Series

  • Face Down in the Marrow-Bone Pie(1997/2000)
  • Face Down Upon An Herbal (1998/2000)
  • Face Down Among the Winchester Geese(1999)
  • Face Down Beneath the Eleanor Cross(2000)
  • Face Down Under the Wych Elm (2000)
  • Face Down Before the Rebel Hooves(2001)
  • Face Down Across the Western Sea (2002)
  • Murders and Other Confusions (2004)
  • Face Down Below the Banqueting House (2005)
  • Face Down Beside St. Anne's Well (2006)
  • Face Down O'er the Border (2007)

Diana Spaulding Mystery Series

  • Deadlier Than the Pen (2004)
  • Fatal as a Fallen Woman (2005)
  • No Mortal Reason (2007)
  • Lethal Legend (2008)

Liss MacCrimmon Mysteries (written as Kaitlyn Dunnett)

  • Kilt Dead (2007)
  • Scone Cold Dead (2008)
  • A Wee Christmas Homicide (2009)
  • The Corpse Wore Tartan (2010)

Children's Books

  • The Mystery of Hilliard's Castle (1985)
  • Julia's Mending (1987)
  • Making Headlines: A Biography of Nellie Bly (1989) (under pseudonym Kaitlyn Gorton)
  • Mystery of the Missing Bagpipes (1989/1991)
  • Katie's Way (2020)

Non-Fiction:

  • Wives and Daughters: The Women of Sixteenth-Century England (1984)
  • Making Headlines: A Biography of Nellie Bly (1989)
  • The Writer's Guide to Everyday Life in Renaissance England (1996)

- How to Write Killer Historical Mysteries (2008)

Selected Resources

Enslin, Theodore (1925 - )

Genre: Poetry

Ted Enslin was born in Chester, Pennsylvania, to parents who were both classical scholars. Enslin studied musical composition privately in Massachusetts at an early age with Francis Judd Cooke and with the great Nadia Boulanger, who recognised his writing talent. He also attended the New England Conservatory of Music. Enslin moved to Temple, Maine in 1960, and with his second wife, Alison Jane Jose (married 1969), to the coastal Washington County village of Milbridge in the 1970s. Besides his long and prolific career as a writer, Enslin has also supported himself by making homemade walking sticks.

While very well-respected by critics and by other poets, Enslin's career has been one of relative obscurity, partly because he is not a self-promoter and he has no academic affiliation. Enslin doesn't see himself as a regional writer, although the Maine landscape has influenced his poems. Enslin's poems are musical, and indeed he has commented "I've often said that I like to be considered as a composer who happens to use words instead of notes." He's also said that "For me, poetry and music are one art. The greatest compliment that anyone could pay me: 'He was a composer who happened to use words.'" Many of Enslin's books and poems have been published by small presses.

Besides the Hart Crane prize for To Come, To Have Become, Enslin also won the Niemann Award in 1955 for his weekly newspaper column, "Six Miles Square."

Selected Bibliography

  • The Work Proposed (1958)
  • Barometric Pressure 29.83 and Steady (a play, produced in New York in 1965)
  • To Come, To Have Become (1966; won the Hart Crane Award)
  • New Sharon's Prospect & Journals (1966)
  • Characters in Certain Places (1967)
  • Views 1-7 (1970)
  • In the Keeper's House (1973)
  • The Last Days of October (1974)
  • The Mornings (1974)
  • Sitio (1974)
  • Fever Poems (1974)
  • Mahler (1975; extended essay)
  • The Median Flow: Poems, 1943-1973
  • Carmina (1976)
  • Ascensions (1977)
  • 16 Blossoms in February (1978)
  • The Fifth Direction (1980)
  • Two Geese: Two Poems (1980)
  • Markings (1981)
  • Processionals (1981)
  • In Duo Concertante (1981)
  • Knee Deep in the Atlantic (1981)
  • Fragments --- Epigrammata (1982)
  • A Man in Stir (1983; graphics by Bill Nelson)
  • Weather within: In Memoriam George Oppen (1986)
  • Music in the Key of C (1995)
  • Then, and Now: Selected Poems 1943-1993 (1998/1999; edited by Mark Nowak; includes 1997 interview with Enslin)
  • Re-sounding: Selected Later Poems (1999)
  • Sequentiae (1999)
  • Nine (2000/2004)

Selected Resources

Davis, Maggie (1943 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Davis lives in East Blue Hill with her husband, together they have six children and four grand-children. For nearly 20 years and over 10 books she was published in NY and elsewhere. In 1993, she founded the publishing company, Heartsong Books. Davis is also a lay-healer and community caregiver. Previously, she worked as a teacher, an editor, a counselor, and a cafe owner.

Selected Bibliography

Juvenile Titles

  • Grandma's Secret Letter (1982)
  • The Best Way to Ripton (1982)
  • Rickety Witch (1984)
  • The Rinky-Dink Cafe (1988)
  • Something Magic (1991; picture book inspired by visits to Isle au Haut)
  • A Garden of Whales(1993; winner of the Vermont Publishers Award)
  • Glory! to the Flowers: a celebration(1995).
  • Roots of Peace, Seeds of Hope: A Journey for Peacemakers (1993) is a book for all ages.

Adult Titles

  • Choices of a Growing Woman (1981/93),
  • Caring in Remembered Ways: The Fruit of Seeing Deeply (1999), a book celebrating compassion as a way of life "for all of us who want to nourish each other in ways we can feel."

Selected Resources

Evans, Abbie (1882 - 1983)

Genre: Poetry

Abbie Evans, noted poet of the natural world, was born in Bristol, Maine and moved to Camden as a teenager. When she was 18, she experienced a serious illness that affected her eyesight and she was unable to read or write for ten years. She spent much of her time observing the natural world as she wandered through the woods and fields in the town. Her frequent companion was Edna St. Vincent Millay whom Evans met when she was Millay's Sunday school teacher.

When Evans was 28, she enrolled at Radcliffe College where she earned both her undergraduate and graduate degrees. She taught English after graduation and then was a Red Cross volunteer during World War I. After the war she was a social worker and then returned to the teaching profession. Although she lived in Philadelphia, she spent her summer vacations in Maine.

Bowdoin College recognized Evans' literary contribution when it granted her an honorary degree in 1961. Three years later the Library of Congress included her in its series Archive of Recorded Poetry and Literature. On the recording, titled Abbie Huston Evans Reading Her Poems in the Recording Laboratory, Jan. 22, 1964. Evans reads poems from her first three collections.

In 1982, the year of Evans' 100th birthday, Down East honored Evans by publishing a feature story on her in the February issue. Mary C. Jane wrote the article titled Nourished on the Mountain's flinty bread

Selected Bibliography

  • Outcrop 1928, forward by Edna St. Vincent Millay
  • Bright North (1938)
  • Fact of Crystal (1961)
  • Collected Poems (1970 published in honor of her 90th birthday.

Selected Resources

Everman, Welch (1946 - 2004)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Born in Allentown, Pennsylvania, Everman was a 1968 Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Northwestern University. A freelance writer for many years, Everman received a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship for Fiction in 1978. The following year he was selected as an artist in residence with the Wisconsin Arts Board. In addition to his writing career, he taught at University of Wisconsin, Edgewood College, and Madison Area Technical College. He continued his formal education at the State University of New York Buffalo where he earned his M.A. (1985) and PhD (1988). He was a recipient of the Butler Prize for Critical Writing in 1985.

In 1987 he accepted an English department appointment at the University of Maine in Orono. Among the courses he taught were American and European fiction, critical theory, Stephen King, and popular culture. He was also one of the original distance learning professors and received the Friends of Distance Education Achievement Award in 2002. Everman was also a jazz fan who played trumpet in a number of bands and also wrote reviews and published interviews.

Everman died in 2004.

Selected Bibliography

  • Orion, a novel (1975)
  • Who Says This? The Authority of the Author, the Discourse, and the Reader (1988)
  • Jerzy Kosinski: The Literature of Violation (1991)
  • The Harry and Sylvia Stories (1992)
  • Cult Horror Films: From Attack of the 50 Foot Woman to Zombies of Mora Tau (1993)
  • Cult Science Fiction From the Amazing Colossal Man to Yog -- the Monster from Space (1995)

Selected Resources

Davis, Owen (1874 - 1956)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film

Born in Portland (some sources say Bangor), Owen Davis lived in Bangor until he was 15 years old, when his family moved to Kentucky. He attended the University of Tennessee for a year and then transferred to Harvard where he majored in geology. He left Harvard before completing his degree and worked as a geologist and mining engineer.

In 1895 Davis went to New York City to work in the theater. His first successful play was produced in 1899. This was the beginning of one of the most prolific American theater careers. He is reported to have written between 200 and 300 plays; the exact number is difficult to determine as he used a variety of pseudonyms such as Arthur Lamb, Martin Hurly, Walter Lawrence, George Walker, and John Oliver. In addition, most of his plays were not published in book form and are therefore difficult to locate. Even the Library of Congress lists only thirty-seven entries for Davis' dramas, screen adaptations, and books. His early plays were called melodramas and were named after the price of the seats. As the majority of the people in the audience were immigrants with limited English skills, Davis stressed visual effects rather than dialogue.

Between 1901 and 1934, there was at least one Owen Davis play produced in New York each season. Despite popular success and financial rewards from such plays, Davis began to write more realistic dramas after 1910. Icebound, which explores the quarrelsome relationships of the icebound Veazie, Maine, Jordan family, was awarded the Pulitzer Prize. Davis was subsequently elected to the National Institute of Arts and Letters(now called the American Academy of Arts and Letters).

Davis wrote film and radio scripts as well as plays in the 1930s. He also dramatized Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby (1926), Buck's The Good Earth (1932), and Wharton's Ethan Frome (1936). During this time he is reported to have had strong connections to the Lakewood Summer Theater, known at the time as Broadway in Maine, in Skowhegan, Maine. In the late 1930s, Davis left Hollywood to return to the New York stage. His last play was produced in 1941.

Davis worked diligently to promote copyright laws for both films and plays. He served as president of both the Authors League of America and the American Dramatists Guild, one of the League's divisions.

Selected Bibliography

  • Through the Breakers
  • Nellie the Beautiful Cloak Model (1906)
  • Icebound 1923
  • No Way Out 1941
  • Mr. and Mrs. North, a comedy in three acts
  • Easy come, easy go; a farce in three acts

Autobiographies

  • I'd Like to Do It Again (1931)
  • My First Fifty Years in the Theatre: the Plays, the Players, the Theatrical Managers and the Theatre Itself as One Man Saw Them in the Fifty Years between 1897 and 1947 (1950)

Selected Resources

Beam, Lura (1887 - 1978)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Lura Beam -- teacher, researcher, and writer -- was born in Marshfield, Maine, near Machias in Washington County, and graduated from the local high school in 1904. Her first two years of college were spent at the University of California, Berkeley. She then transferred to Barnard College, from which she graduated in 1908. For the next three years she taught in southern black schools that were directed by the American Missionary Association. Beam then became an administrator for the Association. She earned an M.A. from Columbia in 1917.

Her entire career of teaching, research, administration and writing was spent in the non-profit area. Other organizations where Beam was employed include the Interchurch World Movement, the Committee on Maternal Health/Maternity Research Council, the Association of American Colleges, and the American Association of University Women.

When Beam worked for the Committee on Maternal Health/Maternity Research Council in the 1920s, she met Louise Stevens Bryant, a social welfare/public health specialist who lived in Bronxville, NY. The two women remained committed friends and companions until Bryant's death in 1957. Often the two women spent their summer vacations in Marshfield. Bryant, fascinated by small town life, encouraged Beam to write the book for which she is best known in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Maine Hamlet. First published in 1957 to little notice, the book was republished in the mid-1980s and a new edition was published in 2000 in connection with the book The Mirror of Maine: One Hundred Books that Reveal the History of the State and The Life of its People.
  • A Thousand Marriages; a Medical Study of Sex Adjustment (1931/1970; with Robert Latou Dickinson)
  • The Single Woman: a Medical Study in Sex Education (1934/1987; with Robert Latou Dickinson)
  • Bequest From a Life; a Biography of Louise Stevens Bryant (1963)
  • He Called Them by the Lightning; a Teacher's Odyssey in the Negro South, 1908-1919 (1967), a monograph

Selected Resources

Hall, Chenoweth (1908 - 1999)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Chenoweth Hall was an artist, musician, writer and teacher. Chennie, as her friends knew her, was born in New Albany, Indiana and spent her formative years in New York. In 1940 Hall moved to Prospect Harbor where she shared a home with writer Miriam Colwell for over fifty years. Hall wrote short stories and published two books. Before her retirement in 1978, Hall was artist-in-residence and associate professor of art at the University of Maine, Machias, for ten years. One of her most noted sculptures is a 4.5 ton memorial to conductor Pierre Monteux and is located in Hancock. Hall died April 19,1999, in Ellsworth. Her watercolors and sculpture continue to be shown in Maine galleries.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Crow on the Spruce, published in 1946, revolves around a powerful family in a Maine fishing village of the 1940s.
  • A Portrait of Maine text for Photography book by Bernice Abbott (1968)

Selected Resources

Papers are located at the Smithsonian Institution.

Hall, Mark (1948 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Horror

Hall, who lives in Richmond, Maine, was raised in Brunswick, Bowdoinham and Durham. A long-time professional musician and a Vietnam War veteran, Hall has held a variety of jobs, though he knew at age 18 that he wanted to be a writer.

He published a short story, "Wasps," in 1995, and his first novel, -- a horror tale about "a strange little village that has somehow gone adrift from the rest of the world" -- was published in print-on-demand format in 2003.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Lost Village (2003)
  • The Holocaust Opera (2005)

Selected Links

Haller, James (1936 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Chef, author, lecturer, and entrepreneur James 'Buddy' Haller, originally from the Chicago area, lives in South Berwick, Maine.

In November 1970, he and two partners opened the Blue Strawbery restaurant in Portsmouth, NH, and for 16 years Haller was co-owner and executive chef at the renowned and popular restaurant.

Haller was featured on New Hampshire Public TV's The Holiday Chef in 1975, and was resident chef for Good Day on WCVB-TV (Boston) from 1975-1985.

In 1986, Haller left the Blue Strawbery and became executive chef and owner of a restaurant in Memphis (TN) for two years before becoming guest chef from 1988-1989 at The Creamery, Canterbury Shaker Village, Canterbury, New Hampshire.

Since the early 1980s, Haller has spent time working with the terminally and critically ill,and was a volunteer and board member of Seacoast Hospice of Exeter, New Hampshire; one of his books offers help for people whose appetites wane when going through serious illness. Haller has lectured on food and cooking and given classes to hospice patients and their families.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Blue Strawbery Cookbook: Cooking Brilliantly Without Recipes (1976)
  • Another Blue Strawbery: More Brilliant Cooking Without Recipes (1983)
  • Cooking in the Shaker Spirit with Jeffrey Paige (1990)
  • What to Eat When You Don't Feel Like Eating (1994) won the Robert Pope Foundation Wellness Award
  • Food and Fitness with Rick Ferreira (1996)
  • Vie De France: Sharing Food, Friendship, and a Kitchen in the Loire Valley (2002)

Day, Holman (1865 - 1935)

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Born in Vassalboro and an 1887 graduate of Colby, Holman Day was a poet, a novelist, and a filmmaker, as well as a correspondent for the Lewiston Sun for years.
He produced over 25 books.

Selected Bibliography

  • Up in Maine: Stories of Yankee Life Told in Verse (1900; his first book of poems)
  • The Legend of Frenche's Isle (1900)
  • An Edict in Modern Acadia (1901)
  • Pine Tree Ballads: Rhymed Stories of Unplaned Human Natur' Up in Maine (1902)
  • Kin o' Ktaadn: Verse Stories of the Plain Folk... (1904)
  • Squire Phin: A Novel (1905; first novel)
  • The Saints of Shiloh: The Story of Evangelist Sandford... (1905)
  • The Rainy Day Railroad War (1906)
  • King Spruce: A Novel (1908)
  • Does Prohibition Pay? maine After Fifty-Seven Years of Prohibition (1908)
  • The Eagle Badge: or, The Skokums of the Allagash (1908)
  • Maine Faces Bitter Facts (1909)
  • The Ramrodders: A Novel (1910)
  • The Skipper and the Skipped, Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron (1911)
  • The Red Lane: A Romance of the Border (1912)
  • The Landloper: The Romance of a Man on Foot (1915)
  • Blow the Man Down: A Romance of the Coast (1916)
  • Where Your Treasure is: Being the Personal Narrative of Ross... (1917)
  • The Rider of the King Log: A Romance of the Northeast Border (1919)
  • All-Wool Morrison: Time: Today. Place: The United States... (1920)
  • When Egypt Went Broke: A Novel (1921)
  • Joan of Arc of the North Woods (1922)
  • Leadbetter's Luck (1923; novel of lumbering in Misery Gore)
  • The Loving are the Daring (1923)
  • When the Fight Begins (1925)
  • Clothes Make the Pirate (1925)
  • Along Came Ruth: A Comedy in Three Acts (1930)
  • The Ship of Joy, Hugh Barrett Dobbs, Commander... (1931)
  • The Pants Jemima Made (1946)

Selected Resources

Selected verse - Maine Author Scrapbooks : a Collection of Newspaper Clippings Vol. 2

Hamlin, Helen (1917 - 2004)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Helen Hamlin was born and raised in Fort Kent among a family of game wardens. She attended Madawaska Training School and accepted her first teaching job at a remote lumber camp at Churchill Dam. She met and married the local warden, Curly. Their early life together in the deep woods is the subject of her first book, which became a New York Times bestseller. After a second marriage to Dr.Robert Lennon, Hamlin left Maine to raise a family, study French and art, and travel the world. Hamlin received the outstanding alumnus award from the University of Maine-Fort Kent in 1988. She died in Minnesota in 2004.

Selected Bibliography

  • Nine Mile Bridge: Three Years in the Maine Woods (1945,1973,2005)

  • Pine, Potatoes, and People (1948,anecdotes about Aroostook Co.)

Selected Resources

Dean, Carol (1951 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Carol Dean, who lives in Winthrop, Maine with her husband John, studied with the Institute of Children's Literature. She has written children's books, illustrated by Maine artist and arts educator Sandra Dunn, who lives in Chelsea.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Hen house: A True Story of Growing Up on a Maine Farm (2003)
  • The Live Bale of Hay: A Real Maine Adventure (2005), based on an incident in Carol's childhood.

Yourcenar, Marguerite (1903 - 1987)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Born in Bailleul, Belgium on June 8, 1903, of a Belgian mother (who died soon after childbirth) and a French father, Marguerite Yourcenar (nee de Crayencour) was a poet, historian, world traveller, translator, essayist, and critic. She studied at Yale University in the 1930s and came to Mount Desert Island's Northeast Harbor in the mid-1940s. She had been visiting the U.S. when the Nazis invaded France and she stayed in the U.S., becoming a citizen in 1947 (later, her French citizenship was restored). Her home on MDI was called Petite Plaisance, and she lived there with her friend, lover, and translator Grace Frick for 40 years. Yourcenar also taught for a decade at Sarah Lawrence College, as professor of comparative literature from 1940-50. She received a Litt.D. from Bowdoin in 1968.

Her first published work was financed when she was 16 by her non-conformist father, who was her tutor and confidant. Her pen name was chosen then, an anagram of her surname. Yourcenar's novels' central figures are often men torn between duty and passion, with a focus on key moments in history.

Yourcenar was the first woman to be elected to the Academie Francaise, in 1980.

After Frick's death of cancer Yourcenar, had a passionate relationship with a 30-year old American, Jerry Wilson, who died of AIDS. Yourcenar died on Dec. 17, 1987, in Northeast Harbor, some say of a broken heart.

Selected Bibliography

  • Les Memoires d'Hadrien(1951)
  • Jardin des chimeres, a poem in dialogue form based on the myth of Icarus.
  • Alexis ou le Traite du vain combat, (1929, in letter format; reissued in 1963 in France and for the first time in English translation in 1984, asAlexis)
  • Feux fires; 1936), a collection of poetic monologues based on classical Greek and Judeo-Christian stories
  • Nouvelles orientales (Oriental Tales, 1938);
  • Le Coup de Grace (1939), about a Prussian solider who murders a woman who loves him because he loves her brother
  • Electre, ou la Chute des Masques (1954)
  • Les Charites d'alcippe (Alms of Alcippe, 1956)
  • Sous Benefice d'inventaire (1962; published in U.S. as The Dark Brain of Piranesi and Other Essays, 1984))
  • Fleuve Profound, Sombre Riviere: Negro Spirituals (1964), with commentary and translation by Yourcenar)
  • L'Oeuvre au noir (1968; first English translation as The Abyss in 1976;
  • Yes, Peut-etre, Shage (1969)
  • Souvenirs Pieux (Dear Departed, 1974), part of La Labyrinthe du monde;
  • La Labyrinthe du monde (1974-1984), a 3-volume memoir which took her to the age of puberty
  • Comme L'eau qui Coule (1982; published in English as Two Lives and a Dream, 1987)
  • Le Temps, Ce Grand Sculpteur (That Mightly Sculptor, Time, 1984/1989), a collection of essays
  • Dreams and Destinies (1999)

Selected links

King, Tabitha (1949 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Tabitha (Tabby) King might be best known for being the wife of Stephen King, but she is also a novelist, photographer, community leader, and philanthropist.

A native of Old Town, Maine, Tabitha King attended the University of Maine in Orono, where she met her husband at a writing seminar. They were married in Jan. 1971 and have three grown children. Tabitha King lives in Bangor with her husband.

Tabitha King has been awarded the Maine Humanities Council Constance H. Carlson Public Humanities Prize (1998), for her 'devoted efforts [which] have kindled a passion for reading and a love of ideas in Maine people of all ages. We honor her activism in supporting reading and literacy programs for Mainers of all ages, her leadership and advocacy on behalf of institutions that bring the joy of learning to a wider public, and her powerful work as a writer.' She also received the Maryann Hartman Award (2001), which recognizes women whose achievements provide inspiration to other women.

She and Stephen King run the Stephen and Tabitha King Foundation, which is well-known in Maine for its generosity to libraries and organizations involved with literacy, community services and the arts.

Tabitha King has also been cited for her leadership of a capital campaign to renovate the Bangor Public Library and her role as a trustee of Maine Public Broadcasting.

As a member of the Maine Humanities Council Board, she encouraged the Council to reach out to at-risk children, adult new readers, library patrons in rural communities, incarcerated men and women, the elderly and the disabled.

Selected Bibliography

  • Small World (1981)
  • Caretakers (1983)
  • The Trap (1985), published in the U.K. as Wolves at the Door
  • Pearl (1988)
  • One on One (1993)
  • The Book of Reuben (1994),
  • Survivor (1997)
  • Candles Burning (2006)

Selected Resources

Hand, Elizabeth (1957 - )

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Short Stories

Elizabeth Hand was born in California and grew up in Pound Ridge, NY. She received her B.A. in playwriting and cultural anthropology from The Catholic University of America in 1984 and moved to Maine in 1988. She has two children with Maine author Richard Grant. Hand primarily writes novels and short stories but she is also the author of plays, comic books, and novelizations of film and television episodes. Her essays and reviews have appeared in The Washington Post, The Village Voice, Salon and Down East. Hand has received many honors, including the Philip K. Dick Award, the Nebula Award, the Mythopeic Society Award and the World Fantasy Award.

Select Bibliography

  • Winterlong 1990
  • Aestival 1992 (second in Winterlong series)
  • Icarus Descending 1993 (third in Winterlong series)
  • Waking the Moon 1995
  • Last Summer at Mars Hill 1998 (short stories)
  • Black Light 1999
  • Mortal Love 2004
  • Saffron and Brimstone: strange stories 2006
  • Generation Loss 2007 (Maine island setting)
  • Illyria 2010
  • Radiant Days: A Novel (2012)
  • Available Dark (2012)
  • Errantry: Strange Stories (2012)
  • Radiant Days: A Novel (2012)
  • Hard Light: A Cass Neary Crime Novel (2016)
  • Curious Toys: A Novel (2019)
  • The Book of Lamps and Banners: A Novel (2020)

Hanstein III, Walter (1953 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Woody Hanstein graduated from the University of Michigan in 1975 and received his J.D. from the University of Idaho in 1979. He was was born in Pennsylvania in 1953, and lived all over the United States before getting the chance to move to Maine in 1984. He is a former Navy JAG and state court prosecutor. He also teaches at the University of Maine at Farmington where, for 20 years, he has coached that college's rugby team. He also is the founder of the Smiling Goat Precision Juggling Corps, Maine's most celebrated troupe of marching jugglers. He has written several legal thrillers featuring small-town Maine lawyer Pete Morris.

Selected Bibliography

  • Not Proven (2000)
  • Cold Snap (2001)
  • State's Witness (2002)
  • Mistrial: A Pete Morris Mystery (2003)
  • Sucker's Bet (2007)
  • Alibi Blonde (2010)

Deans, Sis (1955 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Young Adult

Sis Deans was born on Nov. 4 1955 in Portland, Maine, and raised there. She lives now on a farm in Gorham with her husband and three daughters. She has an associates degree from the University of Maine at Orono (1976) and graduated from the Maine Medical Center School of Surgical Technology in 1985. She has worked in the Mercy Hospital operating room for many years. She also worked for nine years as an animal medical technician for veterinarians, and held jobs as a lifeguard, waitress, and writing instructor. Most of her books are for children and young adults.

Selected Bibliography

  • Chick-A-Dee-Dee-Dee: A Very Special Bird (1987; ill. Nantz Comyns)
  • Emily Bee and the Kingdom of Flowers (1988; ill. Nantz Comyns)
  • The Legend of Blazing Bear (1992; ill. by Nantz Comyns)
  • Decisions and Other Stories (1995; written and photographed by Deans, selected by Cathie Pelletier), a Maine Chapbook Award winner
  • His Proper Post: A Biography of General Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain (1996)
  • Brick Walls (1996)
  • Racing the Past (2001)
  • Rainy (2005)
  • Riding Out the Storm (2012)

Harnum, Robert (1947 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Robert Harnum was born in Maine and educated at the University of Maine. He opposed the war in Vietnam, emigrating to Canada where he pursued graduate and doctoral studies at the University of Toronto and Universite Laval. He simultaneously pursued a musical career.

Harnum has taught at the University of Connecticut, in France at La Grande Ecole de Commerce de Rouen, and at Brewer High School in Brewer, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Exile in the Kingdom (2001) published in France and Canada as La Derniere Sentinelle
  • Le Festin des Lions (1998) AKA The Feast of the Lions
  • Poursuite (2001) AKA Continuation
  • Une Rhapsodie Americaine (2002)

Hartley, Marsden (1877 - 1943)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Marsden Hartley was one of America's most admired and respected modernist painters. Given the name of Edmund Hartley at birth, he assumed the name Marsden, his stepmother's last name, when he was in his early 20s.

The youngest of nine children, Hartley was born in Lewiston, Maine. When he was eight, his mother died. Since the family had little money, he left school at an early age to work in a shoe factory.

By 1890 he had moved to Cleveland where he rejoined his family who had moved there to seek better employment. Hartley, primarily self-taught, was a student for a short time at the Cleveland Art School. After moving to New York, he studied with William Merritt Chase and at the National Academy of Design and the Art Student League.

Hartley, through his association with several New York artists, met Alfred Stieglitz whose "291 Gallery" became one of the key art institutions of the early 20th century. With Stieglitz's assistance, Hartley traveled, studied, and painted in Paris and Germany from 1912 through 1915. He returned often to France and Germany in the 20s and 30s.

By the mid-30s he determined to return to his New England roots, first in Gloucester, Massachusetts, and then Maine. In fact, Hartley, in a 1937 essay titled, "On the Subject of Nativeness: A Tribute to Maine," declared that he wished to be known as the native painter of Maine. The essay can be found in Gail Scott's On Art by Marsden Hartley (1982). Many of his paintings and drawings from the 30s and 40s focus on the Lovell area, Mount Katahdin, and the coast and fishermen of the Corea area.

The Bates College Museum of Art, located in Lewiston, has a noted collection of Hartley paintings and drawings. The largest Hartley collection - 54 works on paper and 61 paintings - is located at The Weisman Art Museum, University of Minnesota.

In addition to being a gifted artist, Hartley was also a poet and essayist. By 1916, his writing had become an important part of his creative life. Just as Stieglitz encouraged him in his artistic efforts, Gertrude Stein, Hart Crane and Sherwood Anderson encouraged Hartley to write. Like many other writers, he was first published in little magazines such as The Little Review, The Dial, Poetry, Contact, and others.

Hartley died in Ellsworth and his ashes were scattered on the Androscoggin River.

Since 1980, Hartley's work as an artist and poet has gained increased attention from both the art and academic worlds.

Selected Bibliography

  • Adventures in the Arts: Informal Chapters on Painters, Vaudeville, and Poets (1921)
  • Twenty-Five Poems (1923)
  • Androscoggin (1940)
  • Sea Burial (1941)
  • Selected Poems (1945)
  • Eight Poems and One Essay by Marsden Hartley (1976)
  • Cleophas and His Own: A North Atlantic Tragedy (1982)
  • Heart's Gate: Letters Between Marsden Hartley and Horace Traubel, 1906-1915 (1982)
  • On Art (1982)
  • Collected Poems of Marsden Hartley, 1904-1943 (1987)

Selected Resources

  • Marsden Hartley by Barbara Haskell (1980)
  • Marsden Hartley by Gail R. Scott (1988)
  • Marsden Hartley and Nova Scotia ed. by Gerald Ferguson (1987)
  • Marsden Hartley: The Biography of an American Artist by Townsend Ludington (1992)
  • Pinnacles and Pyramids: The Art of Marsden Hartley by Jeanne Hokin (1993)
  • Speaking for Vice: Homosexuality in the Art of Charles DeMuth, Marsden Hartley and the First American Avant-garde by Jonathan Edman Weinberg(1993)
  • Marsden Hartley by Bruce Robertson (1995)
  • Dictated by Life: Marsden Hartley's German Paintings and Robert Indiana's Hartley Elegies by Patricia McDonnell (1995)
  • Marsden Hartley: American Modern by Patricia McDonnell(1997)
  • Somehow a Past: The Autobiography of Marsden Hartley (1996)

Selected Resources

Hastings, Corrilla (1936 - )

Genre: Mystery

Garden mystery writer Corrilla Hastings, who grew up in Maine and attended Wellesley College as a botany major, ran Brick Farm Nursery and Garden Center in Skowhegan for 30 years with her husband before recently retiring.

Selected Bibliography

Dead Lady at Green Meadows (1998)

Hathaway, Katharine (1890 - 1942)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Katharine Butler Hathaway was born in 1890 and grew up in Salem, Massachusetts, part of a wealthy family. She suffered from spinal tuberculosis, and was confined to a bed for most of her childhood. Though her treatment was most advanced for the time, she was left disfigured. After attending Radcliffe College, she purchased a house in Castine in 1921 and began a life of her own. She traveled and lived in New York and Paris. In 1932, she married, returned to Maine and settled in Blue Hill. The Feminist Press of New York University considered The Little Locksmith a lost literary classic and reprinted it in 2000.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Little Locksmith, which details both her suffering and her triumphant spirit, was published in 1943, a year after her death. It became a bestseller and a main selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club. Much of the memoir focuses on her house and life in Castine.
  • The Journals and Letters of the Little Locksmith. 1946 a collection of her writings, poems, and drawings

Selected Resources

Katharine Butler Hathaway's papers are in the collection of the Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute.

Klose, Robert (1953 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Klose was raised in New Jersey but moved to Maine in 1981 and is a resident of Bangor and an Asst. Professor of Biological Science at The University of Maine's University College in Bangor. He is a regular contributor to the Christian Science Monitor and is a four‑time winner of the Maine Press Association's annual award for opinion writing.

Klose is the single parent of Alyosha, adopted from Russia when Alyosha was seven, and Anton, from Ukraine.

Besides writing for the Christian Science Monitor, Klose has also been a contributor to the Brunswick Times Record, Newsweek, The Boston Globe, Exquisite Corpse and other newspapers and magazines, writing on diverse topics such as God in America, the Iraq War, adoption, teaching, and growing up in Jersey City.

Selected Bibliography

  • Adopting Alyosha: A Single Man Finds A Son in Russia (1999)
  • Small Worlds: Adopted Sons, Pet Piranhas, and Other Mortals Concerns (2006)
  • The Legend of the River Pumpkins: Based on a True Story (2012) illus. by Steve Klose
  • Life on Mars: A Novel (2019)

Hautala, Rick (1949 - 2013)

Genre: General Fiction, Horror

Horror and suspense writer Hautala was born and raised in Rockport, Massachusetts. He graduated from University of Maine-Orono, with fellow classmate Stephen King, in 1970 and lived in Westbrook. Many of his stories have Maine settings. Rick Hautala died March 21, 2013 of a heart attack.

Selected Bibliography

  • Occasional Demons (2010), a short story collection
  • Untcigahunk: The Complete Little Brothers (- Throat Culture (2005; Body of Evidence)
  • Four Octobers (2003-06), a collection of nostalgic supernatural/suspense 'coming of age' novellas
  • Bedbugs (2000), a collection of 26 short stories, many set in Maine
  • Impulse (1996)
  • The Mountain King (1996/2001- Beyond the Shroud (1995)
  • Twilight Time (1994)
  • Ghost Light (1993)
  • Cold Whisper (1991), set at the University of Maine- Orono
  • Winter Wake (1989)
  • Night Stone (1986)
  • Moondeath(1980)

Body of Evidence series with Christopher Golden

  • Brain Trust (2001)
  • Burning Bones (2001)
  • Skin Deep (2000)

Hautala also wrote under a pseudonym, A.J. Matthews.

  • Unbroken (2007)
  • Follow (2005)
  • Looking Glass (2004)
  • The White Room (2001)

Wilson Jr., Robley (1930 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Robley Wilson, Jr., born in Brunswick, Maine, on 15 June 1930, is a short story writer, novelist, and poet, and was long-time editor (1968-2000) of The North American Review. He also taught in the English department at the University of Northern Iowa (Cedar Falls) from l963 until 2000.

He graduated from Bowdoin College with honors in English in 1957 (receiving an honorary degree from same in 1987) and earned an MFA with distinction from the University of Iowa in 1968.

His stories have appeared in anthologies, including The Pushcart Prize III, Best American Short Stories of l979, The Norton Anthology of Short Fiction, Fiction of the Eighties: A decade of stories from TriQuarterly, and The Ploughshares Reader: New Fiction for the Eighties.

He contributed to Time and Chance: An Iowa Murder Mystery (1998), a serial novel by 17 Iowa writers.

He's married to fiction writer Susan Hubbard, English professor at the University of Central Florida (Orlando). Robley and Hubbard live in Orlando and Cape Canaveral, Florida.

Selected Bibliography

Short Stories

  • The Pleasures of Manhood: Stories (l977)
  • Living Alone: Fictions (l978)
  • Dancing for Men (l983), winner of the l982 Drue Heinz Literature Prize (University of Pittsburgh Press)
  • Terrible Kisses (l989)
  • The Book of Lost Fathers (2001)

Novels

  • The Victim's Daughter (1991)
  • Splendid Omens (2004)
  • The World Still Melting (2005)

Poetry Collections

  • Family Matters (l980)
  • Kingdoms of the Ordinary (l987) Agnes Lynch Starrett Prize for Poetry winner
  • A Pleasure Tree (l990) winner of the 1990 Society of Midland Authors poetry award
  • Everything Paid For (1999)

Selected Links

Hawkes, Kevin (1959 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Hawkes was born in Sherman, Texas. Growing up in a military family, he lived in a number of places in both the United States and Europe. After receiving his B.A. in illustration from Utah State University in 1985. Kevin and his family moved to Maine in 1990 and live in Gorham. Hawkes has written several books but is primarily an illustrator of picture books and novels.

Selected Bibliography

Illustrator

  • The Turnip by Walter de la Mare (1992)
  • By the Light of the Halloween Moon by Caroline Stutson (1993) , Golden Kite Award of the Society of Children's Writers and illustrators
  • Lady Bugatti by Joyce Maxner (1993)
  • The Librarian Who Measured the Earth by Kathryn Lasky (1994)
  • Painting the Wind by Michelle Dionett (1996)
  • My Little Sister Ate One Hare by Bill Grossman (1996)
  • Marven of the Great North Woods by Kathryn Lasky (1997), winner of the Lupine Award
  • Imagine That! Poems of Never-Was by Jack Prelutsky (1998)
  • by Paul Fleischman (1999)
  • And To Think That We Thought That We'd Never Be Friends by Mary Ann Hoberman (1999)
  • Island of the Aunts by Eva Ibbotson (2000)
  • I Was a Rat! by Philip Pullman (2000)
  • Handel, Who Knew What He Liked by M.T. Anderson (2001)
  • The Man Who Made Time Travel by Kathryn Lasky (2003)
  • Granite Baby by Lynne Bertrand (2005)
  • Library Lion by Michelle Knudsen (2006)
  • Velma Gratch And The Way Cool Butterfly by Alan Madison (2007)
  • Bartleby Speaks! by Robin Cruise (2009)

Writer/Illustrator

  • Then the Troll Heard the Squeak (1991)
  • His Royal Buckliness (1992)
  • The Wicked Big Toddlah (2007)

Hawthorne, Nathaniel (1804 - 1864)

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

Born in Salem, MA, Hawthorne lived most of his life there in the Bay State but graduated from Bowdoin College with Henry Wadsworth Longfellow in 1825. Hawthorne also lived in Portland in 1818 and in Raymond for a few years around 1816.

He was a writer of novels and short stories, a member of the American Romantic school, specifically known as a "Dark Romantic." The plots of his work usually centered around themes of evil, sin and morality. His great- great- grandfather was John Hathorne, a judge who oversaw the Salem Witch Trials.

Selected Bibliography

  • Fanshawe (1828)
  • Twice Told Tales (1837)
  • Mosses from an Old Manse (1846)
  • The House of the Seven Gables, a Romance (1851)
  • The Scarlet Letter, a Romance (1850)
  • The Snow-Image, and Other Twice-Told Tales (1851)
  • True Stories from History and Biography (1851)
  • The Blithedale Romance(1852)
  • The Life of Franklin Pierce (1852)
  • A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys (1852)
  • Tanglewood Tales for Girls and Boys (1853)
  • The Marble Faun; or, The Romance of Monte Beni (1860)
  • Our Old Home (1863)
  • Passages from the American Note-Books (1868)
  • Passages from the English Note-Books (1870)
  • Passages from the French and Italian Note-Books (1871)
  • Septimius, a Romance (1872)

Selected Links

Deland, Margaret (1857 - 1945)

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Novelist, Margaret Deland was born in Allegheny, Pa., and was raised by her uncle and his wife,. They lived in Manchester, Pa, which she transformed into the fictional "Old Chester" of her stories. She attended Pelham Priory School in New Rochelle, NY, and studied design at Cooper Union (NYC) for a year, and she was for a short time a drawing instructor at what is now Hunter College. Deland married Lorin Fuller Deland in 1880 and they lived in Kennebunkport, Maine (summers), and in Cambridge, Mass. She was awarded an honorary degree from Bowdoin College in 1931.

The Delands became involved in the plight of unwed mothers and took into their home about 60 women and infants in the space of 4 years. During this time, Deland began writing for greeting-card companies.

Deland's first published work was a poem, "The Succory," which appeared in Harpers magazine. During World War I, Deland did relief work in France and received the Legion of Honor. She was elected to the National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1926.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Old Garden and other verses (1886), her only volume of poetry.
  • John Ward, Preacher (1888; the deep conflict between a preacher and his wife, who doesn't believe in eternal damnation)
  • Florida Days (1889)
  • A Summer Day (1889)
  • Philip and His Wife (1890)
  • Sidney: The Story of a Child (1892)
  • Mr Tommy Dove and other stories (1893)
  • The Wisdom of Fools (1897)
  • Old Chester Tales (1898)
  • Good for the Soul (1899)
  • Dr. Lavendar's People (1903)
  • The Common Way (1904)
  • The Awakening of Helena Richie (1906)
  • An Encore (1907)
  • Where the Laborers Are Few (1909)
  • The Way to Peace (1910)
  • The Iron Woman (1911)
  • The Voice (1912)
  • Partners (1913)
  • The Hands of Esau (1914)
  • Around Old Chester (1915)
  • The Rising Tide (1916)
  • The Story of Delia (1919)
  • The Promises of Alice (1919)
  • Small Things (1919)
  • An Old Chester Secret (1920)
  • The Vehement Flame (1922)
  • New Friends in Old Chester (1924)
  • The Kays (1926)
  • Captain Archer's Daugther (1932)
  • Confession (1933)
  • If This Be I (1935, autobiography)
  • Old Chester Days (1935)
  • Golden Yesterdays (1941, autobiography)

Selected Resources

Wight, Tamra (1963 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Tamra Wight was born in Charlton, Massachusetts on 7 Dec. 1963 and raised there. She graduated from Shepherd Hill Regional High School in 1981, and then attended Becker Junior College in Leicester, MA, earning an associate degree in Travel and Tourism.

She and her family moved to Poland Spring, Maine in 1991 and are the owners of Poland Spring Campground on Lower Range Pond.

She published her first picture book for children in September 2003.

Bibliography

  • The Three Grumpies (2003)

DeMarco, Tom (1940 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Short Stories

Tom DeMarco (born Aug. 20, 1940), who lives in Camden, has written two novels, a collection of short stories, and several non-fiction books, as well as hundreds of articles and essays in his fields of management and the system development process. He is a principal of the Atlantic Systems Guild, a computer systems think tank with offices in New York and London. In addition to his business and writing careers, he's also a certified emergency medical technician.

DeMarco, who earned a BSEE degree from Cornell University, an M.S. from Columbia University, and a diploma from the University of Paris at the Sorbonne, began his computing career with Bell Telephone Laboratories. He was later responsible for distributed on-line banking systems installed in Europe, and he has lectured and consulted throughout the Americas, Europe, Africa, Australia and the Far East.

Selected Bibliography

Non-Fiction

  • Structured Analysis and System Specification (1979)
  • Concise Notes on Software Engineering (1979)
  • Controlling Software Projects: Management, Measurement and Estimation (1982)
  • Peopleware: Productive Projects and Teams (1987/1999, with Tim Lister)
  • Software State-of-the-Art: Selected Papers (1990, co-edited with Tim Lister)
  • Why Does Software Cost So Much? (And Other Puzzles of the Information Age) (1995; essays)
  • Slack: Getting Past Burnout, Busywork and the Myth of Total Efficiency (2001)
  • Waltzing With Bears: Managing Risk on Software Projects (2003; co-authored with Tim Lister)

Fiction

  • The Deadline: A Novel About Project Management (1997), the story of a veteran software manager who bets his life on a delivery date.
  • Dark Harbor House (2001), which he describes as 'a gentle coming-of-age story that takes place in the late 1940s on an island off the coast of Maine'
  • Lieutenant America and Miss Apple Pie (2002), 12 short stories, most set in Maine

Selected Resources

Willard, Christopher (1960 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Christopher Willard, born in Bangor, Maine, is a writer, visual artist, and instructor who lives in Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

He lived in New York for 15 years and taught at Hunter College (CUNY) in New York City for 10.

He received his B.F.A. from the Portland School of Art (Maine) and his M.F.A. from Hunter College. His art appears in collections worldwide including the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He has published over 50 articles in art magazines, journals, and books, and had a monthly column in American Artist.

Selected Bibliography

  • Watercolor Mixing: The 12-Hue Method (2000)
  • Garbage Head (2005)

Heinrich, Bernd (1940 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Bernd Heinrich was born in Germany (April 19, 1940) and moved to Wilton, Maine as a child. He studied at the University of Maine and UCLA and is Professor Emeriti of Biology at the University of Vermont. He spends much of the year at a rustic cabin that he built himself in the woods near Weld, Maine. Many of his books focus on the natural world just outside the cabin door. Heinrich has won numerous awards for his writing and is a world class ultra-marathon runner.

Selected Bibliograhy

  • Bumblebee Economics (1979)
  • In a Patch of Fireweed (1984)
  • One Man's Owl (1987)
  • Ravens in Winter (1989)
  • Owl in the House: A Naturalist's Diary (1990)
  • The Hot-Blooded Insects: Strategies and Mechanics of Thermoregulation (1993)
  • A Year in the Maine Woods (1994)
  • The Thermal Warriors: Strategies of Insect Survival (1996)
  • The Trees in My Forest (1997)
  • Mind of the Raven: Investigations and Adventures with Wolf-Birds (1999)
  • Racing the Antelope: What Animals Can Teach Us About Running and Life (2001)
  • Why We Run: A Natural History (2002)
  • Winter World: The Ingenuity of Animal Survival (2003)
  • The Geese of Beaver Bog (2003)
  • The Snoring Bird: My Family's Journey Through a Century of Biology (2007)
  • Summer World: A Season of Bounty (2009)
  • Life Everlasting: The Animal Way of Death (2012)

Desjardin, Thomas ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Tom Desjardin was born and raised in Maine. He received his bachelor's and master's degrees from Florida State University, and did his doctoral work in American History at the University of Maine at Orono. He's worked as a National Parks interpreter, giving programs on the Gettysburg battlefield. His interest in the topic grew from a visit to Gettysburg as a boy, and his is also based on the same.

Selected Bibliography

  • Stand Firm, Ye Boys of Maine: The 20th Maine at Little Round Top (1995), the story of the 20th Maine Infantry (and the 15th and 47th Alabama) from June 21 through July 10, 1863.
  • Joshua L. Chamberlain (1999), a biography of Chamberlain
  • These Honored Dead: How The Story Of Gettysburg Shaped American Memory (2003)
  • Through a Howling Wilderness: Benedict Arnold's March to Quebec, 1775 (2006), a history of Benedict Arnold's 200-mile march through northern Maine

Selected Resources

  • Chapter Six of Stand Firm about Joshua Chamberlain, is online.

Dibner, Martin (1912 - 1991)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Martin Dibner, who resided in Casco, Maine, was born in Brooklyn, New York. He received a B.A. in banking and finance from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, in 1933. He also studied at the Art Students League in New York. After college, New York and Miami commercial art firms and newspapers employed him as an art or creative director. His Navy experience during World War II provided the plot and characters for several of his novels. After the war, he did graduate work in painting and sculpture at Rollins College in Florida.

Dibner was awarded a Breadloaf Fellowship in 1960. Two years later he was a Huntington Hartford Foundation fellow. In the late 1960s, Dibner was appointed the first director of the California Art Commission. In the early 1970s he moved to Maine where he had vacationed for many years. When Westbrook College's Joan Whitney Payson Gallery opened in 1977, Dibner was hired as its first director.

Dibner entered a new phase of his creative career when he became a mentor and teacher to many Maine short story and novel writers who studied creative writing with him. The Maine Community Foundation honors and memorializes Dibner's commitment to emerging talent in its annual Martin Dibner Fellowships.

Selected Bibliography

Fiction

  • The Bachelor Seals, (1948)
  • The Deep Six (1953), his most popular novel, released as a film in 1958.
  • Showcase, (1958)
  • Sleeping Giant (1960)
  • A God For Tomorrow (1961)
  • The Admiral: A Novel (1967)
  • The Trouble With Heroes (1971)
  • Ransom Run (1977)
  • Devil's Paintbrush (1983)

Non-fiction

  • A History Of Casco, Maine (1976)
  • Seacoast Maine; People And Places (1973/1987) text for George Tice's photographic book.
  • Portrait of Paris Hill : a landmark Maine village (1990)
  • John Muench: Paintings And Prints 1950-1990 / with An Introductory Essay By Judith Sobol And A Biography by Martin Dibner (1991)
  • The Arts in California; a Report to the Governor and the Legislature By the California Arts Commission on the Cultural and Artistic Resources of the State of California (1966)

Selected Resources

Williams, Ben (1889 - 1953)

Genre: General Fiction

A native Mississippian (born Macon, MS, 7 March 1889) who spent his childhood in Ohio, Williams graduated from Dartmouth in 1910, worked as a reporter for the Boston American from 1910-1916, and went on to live outside of Boston, summering in North Searsmont and Blue Hill. He wrote over 35 novels and 400 short stories, many set in the mythical village of Fraternity, Maine (similar to his home in the Searsmont area), as well as some histories and other non-fiction works.

His wife, Florence Trafton Talpey of York, Maine, was descended from a long line of sea captains.

Williams received honorary degrees in American literature from Dartmouth College and Colby College.

Ben Ames Williams died on 4 Feb. 1953.

Selected Bibliography

  • All the Brothers Were Valiant (1919)
  • The Sea Bride (1919)
  • The Great Accident (1920)
  • Evered (1921)
  • Black Pawl (1922)
  • Thrifty Stock and Other Stories (1923)
  • Audacity (1924)
  • The Rational Hind (1925)
  • The Silver Forest (1926; also published as A Killer Among Us (1957)
  • Immortal Longings (1927)
  • Splendor (1927)
  • The Dreadful Night (1928)
  • The Bellmer Mystery (1929; also released as Death on Scurvy Street (1949)
  • Great Oaks (1930)
  • An End to Mirth (1931)
  • Pirate's Purchase (1931)
  • Honeyflow (1932)
  • Money Musk(1932; published in 1948 as Lady in Peril)
  • Mischief (1933)
  • Pascal's Mill (1933)
  • Hostile Valley (1934; later printed as Valley Vixen (1948)
  • Small Town Girl (1935)
  • Crucible and It's A Free Country (1937)
  • The Strumpet Sea (1938)
  • Thread of Sea (1939)
  • Come Spring (1940)
  • The Strange Woman (1941)
  • Time of Peace: Sept. 26, 1930 - Dec. 7, 1941 (1942)
  • Amateurs at War: The American Soldier in Action (1943)
  • Leave Her To Heaven (1944)
  • House Divided (1947)
  • Fraternity Village (1949)
  • The Diary from Dixie (1949)
  • Owen Glen (1950)
  • The Unconquered (1953)
  • The Happy End (1991)

Selected Resources

Dietz, Lew (1907 - 1977)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Dietz, born in Pittsburgh, a graduate of New York University and a long-time resident of Rockport, lived in Maine for more than 40 years. During his early working years, he was a foreign correspondent in Paris and a copywriter in New York. In his middle years he gained recognition for his many magazine articles on fishing and hunting for Coast Fisherman, Outdoors Maine, and Down East, which he helped establish. In the 1950s he published the popular Jeff White series in which the action was also focused on hunting and fishing.

Selected Bibliography

Non-Fiction

  • Andre The Seal (1975), the story of a Rockport Harbor orphan seal whose feeding times became a local tourist attraction for many summers. The book was the source for the film 'Andre' (1995).
  • Night Train at Wiscasset Station: An Unforgettable Portrait of Maine and Its People, which is considered one of the classic Maine books. The book combines Dietz's words with Kosti Ruohomaa's (1914-1961) black and white photographs of ordinary rural and fishing industry Mainers.
  • The Story of Boothbay c1937, Camden Hills. An Informal History of the Camden-Rockport Region (1947)
  • The Allagash (1968), originally published as part of the Rivers of America' series
  • Touch of Wildness; a Maine Woods Journal (1970).

The Jeff White Series

  • Jeff White: Young Woodsman (c1949)
  • Jeff White: Young Guide (1951)
  • Jeff White, Young Trapper (1951)
  • Jeff White, Young Lumberjack (1952)
  • Jeff White: Forest Fire Fighter (1954)

Other Juvenile Titles

  • Pines for the King's Navy (1955)
  • Full Fathom Five (1958), illustrated by his wife artist Denny Winters
  • Wilderness River (1961)
  • The Savage Summer (1964), also illustrated by Denny Winter
  • The Year of the Big Cat (1970)

Selected Resources

Dionetti, Michelle (1947 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Michelle Dionetti has lived in York, ME, since 1978. She's a touring artist, teaching in schools throughout the state and at writers' conferences throughout northern New England.

Selected Bibliography

  • Thalia Brown and the Blue Bug (1979)
  • The Day Eli Went Looking For Bear (1980)
  • Coal Mine Peaches (1991) illustrated by Anita Riggio)
  • Painting the Wind: A Story of Vincent van Gogh (1996/1997; illus. Kevin Hawkes),
  • Mice to the Rescue (1995; illus. Carol Newsom).

Williamson, Joanne (1925 - 2002)

Genre: Young Adult

Joanne S. Williamson was born in Arlington, Virginia. She was a student Barnard College from 1942-1944 and then attended the Diller Quaile School of Music from 1944-1946.

Before moving to Kennebunkport in 1956, she was employed as a writer and editor for several newspapers and magazines in New York City and Connecticut.

In 1956, her first first novel was published; it was the first of Williamson's eight young adult historical novels.

In addition to her writing, Williamson also taught piano from 1956 until her retirement in 1990.

Selected Bibliography

  • Jacobin's Daughter (1956)
  • The Eagles Have Flown (1957)
  • Hittite Warrior (1960)
  • The Glorious Conspiracy (1961)
  • The Iron Charm (1964)
  • And Forever Free (1966)
  • To Dream Upon a Crown (1967)
  • God King (2002)

DiPhilippo, Kathryn (1968 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

South Portlander Kathy DiPhilippo, a Maine resident since she was three months old, was born in Lynn, Massachusetts. She is a 1986 graduate of South Portland High School and a 1990 graduate of the University of New Hampshire with a degree in hotel administration. She was previously employed as Vice President of Credit Services for a food industry credit reporting agency, as a bank commercial loan underwriter, and as the credit manager for a major seafood importer located in New York. She is the historian for the South Portland Historical Societyand writes a weekly column, A Window on the Past, for The South Portland Sentry.

Selected Bibliography

  • South Portland: A Nostalgic Look At Our Neighborhood Stores, is a unique local history publication. It's the story of the city's 20th-century neighborhoods by means of a street-by-street history of retail businesses as seen through historic photographs, resident remembrances, and in-depth research.

Selected Resources

Dodd, Anne (1940 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Anne Wescott Dodd lives in Brunswick, Maine, and is chair of the Dept. of Education at Bates College in Lewiston. She received her B.A. from Univ. of Maine in history and government, her M.A. from California State Univ at Los Angeles in English and American Studies, and her Ed.D. in educational leadership from Univ. of Maine. She has taught at Univ. of Maine, Augusta; Colby College; and as a secondary school teacher in Maine and California, including a position as principal of Freeport Middle School. Dodd is also co-editor of the Journal of Maine Education.

Dodd has published over 100 articles on education, language arts, and other topics.

Selected Bibliogrpahy

  • From Images to Words: A Visual Approach to Writing (1986)
  • Practical Strategies for Taming the Paper and People Problems in Teaching (1987)
  • A Handbook for Substitute Teachers (1989)
  • Beachcombing and Beachcrafting (1989)
  • A Parent's Guide to Innovative Education: Working with Teachers, Schools and Your Children for Real Learning (1992)
  • Footprints and Shadows (1992; children's book; illus. Henri Sorensen)
  • Parents as Partners in Learning: Their Beliefs About Effective Practices for Teaching and Learning High School English (1994)
  • Making Our High Schools Better: How Parents and Teachers Can Work Together (2000) with Jean L. Konzal
  • The Story of the Sea Glass (1999; children's picture book, which takes place on a Maine island; illus. Mary Beth Owens), which won the Golden Trap Award from the Maine Island Libraries Association.

Selected Resources

Dodson, James (1953 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Jim Dodson was raised in the Carolinas but moved to New England in the 1980s to become a senior writer for Yankee Magazine. Previously, he had been a reporter for the Washington Post and a political journalist and a Sunday magazine writer at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Dodson earned his reputation as a sports writer as contributing editor and regular columnist for Golf magazine and golf editor for Departures magazine, winning the Golf Writers of America Award in 1995. Dodson now lives in Topsham, Maine.

Selected Bibliogrpahy

  • Final Rounds: A Father, a Son, the Golf Journey of a Lifetime, (1996)
  • Faithful Travelers: A Father, a Daughter, a Fly-Fishing Journey of the Heart (1998)
  • A Golfer's Life Co-witten autobiography of Arnold Palmer
  • Ben Hogan (2004)
  • The Dewsweepers: Seasons in Golf and Friendship (2001)
  • The Road to Somewhere: Travels With a Young Boy in an Old World (2003)
  • Beautiful Madness: One Man's Journey Through Other People's Gardens (2006)
  • American Triumvirate: Sam Snead, Byron Nelson, Ben Hogan, and the Modern Age of Golf (2012)

Selected Resources

Domench, Dan (1951 - )

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, Short Stories

Playwright and short story writer Dan Domench, who lives now in Hope, Maine, moved to Portland, Maine in 1979 after living in San Francisco, Iowa City, Los Angeles, and the village of Rochester in northern Alberta, Canada. A second generation American, the son of a Basque father and an Irish mother, he grew up in the San Joaquin Valley of California. While writing, he has worked in a lumber mill, bar tended, drove a mail truck, owned a rock music booking agency, picked fruit, operated a forklift, assembled farm equipment, and assisted released prisoners to maintain their terms of parole.

His stories have been published in Portland Monthly, Puckerbrush and the USM literary magazine. A showcase of his monologues was produced off-Broadway at the Westside Theater. Domench collaborated with Maine musician Peter Gallway on two musicals, 'Testify' (1984) and 'Sonny's Wedding' (1986), and he served as Theater Director of The Maine Festival for 1982 and 1983. He also created and performed a series of pieces for Maine Public Radio's 'All Things Considered' (1987).

Selected Bibliography

  • Inside Vacationland: New Fiction from the Real Maine (1985), edited by Maine writer Mark Melnicove;
  • Three American One-Act Monologues (1983)a chapbook was praised on the back cover by Raymond Carver and Robert Haas
  • Hold Me Fast (2005) audio book with 10 monologues/stories performed by various artists

Selected Resources

Doty, Charles (1928 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

C. Stewart Doty earned his Ph.D. at Ohio State in 1964. A professor of history at the University of Maine from 1964-1996 and chair of the history department from 1986-1992, he taught Modern French, European, and Franco-American History. He received the university's 1994 Presidential Research and Creative Achievement Award. Granted emeritus status when he retired in 1996, Doty now resides in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Doty's articles and book reviews have appeared in journals such as The American Review of Canadian Studies, The Journal of American History, Quebec Studies Journal, and Journal of Contemporary History.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Industrial Revolution (1969)
  • Western Civilization: Recent Interpretations, editor of both volumes (1973)
  • From Cultural Rebellion to Counterrevolution: The Politics of Maurice Barres (1976)
  • The First Franco-Americans: New England Life Histories from the Federal Writers' Project, 1938-1939.
  • Acadian Hard Times: The Farm Security Administration in Maine's St. John Valley, 1940-1943 (1991/1996) is included in The Mirror of Maine, a list of 100 significant Maine books.

Selected Resources

  • Papers at the University of Maine.

Doudera, Victoria (1961 - )

Genre: Mystery, Non-Fiction

Freelance writer Vicki Doudera grew up in Norfolk, Mass. She attended Hamilton College (Clinton, NY), graduating in 1983 with a B.A. in Comparative Literature, minoring in French. From 1986-1998, she and her husband Ed operated the Blackberry Inn Bed-and-Breakfast in Camden, Maine; they live now in Camden with three children, two cats, a dog, and a rat named George.

Doudera has contributed dozens of articles to major publications including Yankee Parenting, Readers Digest, The Old Farmer's Almanac The Gardener's Companion, Maine Boats & Harbors.

Selected Bibliography

Non Fiction

  • Moving to Maine: The Essential Guide to Get You There, (2000)
  • Where to Retire in Maine, (2003)

Fiction

  • A house to die for (2010)
  • Deadly Offer: A Darby Farr Mystery (2012)
  • Final Settlement: A Darby Farr Mystery (2013)

Selected Resources

Dudley, Jane (1918 - 2003)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Jane Gerow Dudley, writer and naturalist, was a New Jersey native who lived in Maine from the mid-1960s until the early 1990s. She contributed to numerous publications as journalist, columnist and poet, including the Maine Times, Yankee magazine, Reed Poetry Annual of Maine, and the Boston Post. She was longtime editor of the Schoodic chapter of the Maine Audubon newsletter. She was also president and founder of the Alexander-Crawford Historical Society (Alexander, Maine) and wrote its newsletter.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Maine-New Brunswick connection Genealogy periodical edited from 1984-1988.

Dunn, Sandra ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Sandy Dunn is an artist, arts educator, and children's book illustrator who lives in Chelsea, Maine with her husband, photographer Steven Dunn. She has a BFA and a B.S. in Art from the University of Southern Maine and has studied art at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts School, Whitelands College in London, Round Top Center for the Arts, and the Maine College of Art. She's worked as an art instructor in public schools for more than 15 years and also offers private lessons and workshops. Her paintings (watercolors and acrylics) have been exhibited in shows around Maine.

Selected Bibliography

Illustrator

  • The Laughing Lighthouse (1995), written by Katy Perry
  • Gardens Are For Looking (1996), written by Katy Perry
  • The Henhouse: A True Story of Growing Up on a Maine Farm (2003), written by Carol Dean
  • The Live Bale of Hay: A Real Maine Adventure (2005), written by Carol Dean
  • Children are No Match For Fire: A Fire Safety Story for the Whole Family (2006), written by Carol Dean

Author and Illustrator

  • Orville Wonders Why (1997), a picture book about differences between an ostrich and an eagle.

Selected Resources

Dutton, Sandra ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's book writer, poet, and essayist Sandra Dutton was born in Springfield, Missouri, grew up in Norwood, Ohio, and moved to Boothbay Harbor after many years as a summer visitor. Her sea captain ancestors settled in Bath in the 1840s. Dutton has a Master's in Creative Writing and a Ph.D. in Rhetoric and Composition; she taught writing and literature at the University of Louisville and the New York Institute of Technology. While living in Louisville in the 1980s, she founded, published, and edited The River City Review.

Selected Bibliogrpahy

  • The Magic of Myrna C. Waxweather (1987)
  • The Cinnamon Hen's Autumn Day (1988)
  • Tales of Belva Jean Copenhagen (1989)
  • Just a Matter of Time (2000; a book and a musical)
  • Capp Street Carnival (2003)
  • Dear Miss Perfect: A Beast's Guide to Proper Behavior (2007)
  • Mary Mae and the Gospel Truth (2010)

Selected Resources

Holland, Barbara (1925 - 1988)

Genre: Poetry

Poet Barbara Holland was born in Portland, Maine on July 12, 1925, and raised in Philadelphia. Her parents were both professors, and her father was also chief of the fine arts division at the Library of Congress.

Holland attended Smith College, and went on to earn a B.A. and an M.A. in English literature from the University of Pennsylvania, then moved to New York City's Greenwich Village, where she worked as a poet until her death in 1988.

Holland's poems have been published in more than a thousand literary journals, including The New York Poetry Quarterly, The Beloit Poetry Review, and Antioch Review.

Holland was well known as a powerful reader of her own poetry.

Selected Bibliography

  • Medusa
  • Lens, Light and Sound
  • Return in Sagittarius (1965)
  • A Game of Scraps: Poems of A MacDougal Midway (1967)
  • Autumn Wizard (1973)
  • Melusine Remembered (1974)
  • On This High Hill (1974)
  • Burrs (1978)
  • In the Shadows (1979?)
  • Collected Poems, Volume 1 (1980)
  • Running Backwards: Selected Poems (1983)

Holman, Doris (1937 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Doris Anne Holman (born 18 Oct. 1937) grew up in Chevy Chase Maryland in 1970. She graduated from Goucher College in 1959 and later earned a Master's in Reading from Loyola College. In 1970 she moved to Wayne, Maine and taught in the Monmouth school system for 27 years. Now she divides her time between Zephyr Hills, Florida and Harpswell, Maine. Although her education and career focused on teaching and reading, art is her passion. She is a watercolor artist and owns the "Round the Corner Art Gallery" on Orr's Island. Holman published her first book, Come With Me to the Sea (1998), as a way to introduce her grandchildren to the ocean. The illustrations were painted at Reid State Park and Popham Beach.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Great Egret (1999)
  • Watercolor Sparkles (2001)
  • Ollie, The Little Burrowing Owl (2001)
  • Harry, the Great Blue Heron (2002)
  • Come with Me to the Pond (2004), a book in verse about inland Maine in the summer
  • The Old Fisherman and the Pelican (2005)

Holmes, Barbara ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's author Barbara Ware Holmes summers in Port Clyde, Maine. She received her M.A. from Northeastern University in 1969.

Selected Bibliography

  • Charlotte Cheetham, Master of Disaster (1985)
  • Charlotte the Starlet (1988)
  • Charlotte Shakespeare & Annie the Great (1989)
  • My Sister the Sausage Roll (1997)
  • Letters to Julia (1997; ALA Best Young Adult Novel)
  • Following Fake Man (2001) Maine setting

Willis, William (1794 - 1870)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

William Willis was born in Haverhill, MA August 31, 1794 and died February 17, 1870 in Portland, ME. He was a lawyer who is considered the most important nineteenth-century Portland historian.

He graduated from Harvard in 1813 and was admitted to the Suffolk bar in January of 1817.

He practiced law in Boston until April of 1819, then moved his practice to Portland, ME in 1820. In 1835, he began a twenty-year partnership with William Pitt Fessenden.

In 1849 he edited the Journals of the Rev. Thomas Smith and the Rev. Samuel Deane. Smith and Deane were the pastors of the First Parish Church in Portland. Their journals record their experiences from 1726-1814 and provide an invaluable view of 18th-century social and political life. The book is included in The Mirror of Maine: One Hundred Distinguished Books That Reveal the History of the State and the Life of Its People.

Willis's political career included a term as state senator in 1855 and he served as Portland's mayor in 1857.

Bowdoin College granted him an honorary degree in 1867.

Selected Bibliography

  • The History of Portland (1831)
  • Collections of the Maine Historical Society (1831-1859)
  • A History of the Laws, the Courts, and the Lawyers of Maine (1873)

Selected Links

Bowdoin College Willis papers collection

Wilson, Dorothy (1904 - 2003)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Dorothy Clarke Wilson was born in Gardiner on 9 May 1904. A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Bates College in 1925, she married fellow student Elwin L. Wilson in August of that year. After his seminary training at Princeton Theological Seminary and Boston University School of Theology, Dorothy and Elwin returned to the state of Maine where he served Methodist churches and the Maine Methodist Conference as a District Superintendent. The Wilson Center at the University of Maine, which Rev. Elwin served from 1950-1955 (then called the Maine Christian Association) was named in honor of the Wilsons.

In 1928, Wilson began her writing life when she sold a play she had written for the church she and Elwin were serving in Scarborough.

Many of her books had Biblical themes or were focused on the lives of missionaries. He best known book, Prince of Egypt (1949), won the Westminster prize for the best religious book of the year and was also one of the sources for the film The Ten Commandments. Despite the Academy Award it won, Wilson did not like the film and has been reported to have used the word 'flimflammery' to describe the scene in which Moses parted the Red Sea. She is also well known for her biographies about women such as Dorothea Dix and Elizabeth Blackwell as well as First Ladies Dolly Madison and Martha Washington.

Among the many honors Wilson received were honorary degrees of Doctor of Letters from Bates in 1948 and the University of Maine in 1984. The University also honored her with its 1988 Maryann Hartman Award.

Westbrook College presented her with its 1989 Deborah Morton Award.

Her work for peace and justice was recognized when she received the New England United Methodist Award for Excellence in Social Justice Ministry in 1975.

In 1988 the American Association of University Women also honored her for her justice work.

A large collection of her manuscripts, papers, letters, etc., is available at the Fogler Library at the University of Maine. Both Orono High School and the University of Maine offer the Dorothy Clarke Wilson Peace Awards.

Wilson died on 26 March 2003.

Selected Bibliography

  • Twelve Months of Drama for the Average Church (1933)
  • The Herdsman (1946)
  • Prince of Egypt (1949)
  • House of Earth (1952)
  • Fly with Me to India (1954)
  • That Heaven of Freedom: A One-Act Play of India (1954)
  • Jezebel (1955)
  • The Gifts: The Story of the Boyhood of Jesus (1957)
  • Dr. Ida: The Story of Dr. Ida Scudder of Vellore [India] (1959)
  • The Journey (1962)
  • Take My Hands: The Remarkable Story of Dr. May Verghese (1963)
  • The Tree Gifts (1963)
  • Ten Fingers for God (1966)
  • Handicap Race: The Inspiring Story of Roger Arnett (1967)
  • Palace of Healing: The Story of Dr. Clara Swain, first woman missionary doctor, and the hospital she founded (1968)
  • Lone Woman: The Story of Elizabeth Blackwell, the first woman doctor (1970)
  • The Big-Little World of Doc Pritham, a Greenville doctor (1971)
  • Hilary: The Brave World of Hilary Pole (1972)
  • Bright Eyes: The Story of Susette La Flesche, an Omaha Indian (1974)
  • Stranger & Traveler: The Story of Dorothea Dix, American Reformer (1975)
  • Granny Brand: Her Story (1976)
  • Twelve Who Cared: My Aventures with Christian Courage (1977)
  • Apostle of Sight (1980)
  • Lincoln's Mothers (1981)
  • Lady Washington (1984)
  • The Brother (1984)
  • Queen Dolley: The Life and Times of Dolley Madison (1987)
  • Alice and Edith: The Two Wives of Teddy Roosevelt (1989)
  • Leaves in the Wind: A Lifetime in Verse (1995)
  • Live for Hundred Years: A History of the Maine Christian Association (1996)
  • Union in Diversity (1999, 2nd ed., memoirs)

Selected Resources

Wilson, Hazel (1898 - 1992)

Genre: Children's Literature

Hazel Wilson was born in Portland on 8 April 1898. She lived on Munjoy Hill and attended Portland schools.

Munjoy Hill (or, The Hill, as it is known in Portland) is the location of The Surprise of Their Lives, published in 1957.

Wilson graduated from Bates College in 1919 and the following year earned a Master of Library Science from Simmons College. She returned to Portland where she was employed as the librarian at Portland High School from 1920 to 1923. Later, she was a librarian at the Northeast Missouri Teachers College (1923-1926), American Library in Paris(1926-1928), and at Bradford Academy (1928-1929), and was supervisor of Denver school libraries in 1929 and 1930.

Although her library career ended when she married, Wilson's knowledge of children and books helped her create characters and plots that make her books appealing to both child and adult readers. She was also a book reviewer for publications in the Washington, D.C., area and was a lecturer at George Washington University from 1956 to 1967.

Bates College awarded Wilson an honorary Master of Arts in 1956.

She earned The Ohioana Award for Island Summer, the Boys Club of America Junior Book Award for Thad Owen, and the Edison Award for His Indian Brother.

She died in Bethesda, Maryland on 20 Aug. 1992.

Selected Bibliography

Books set in Maine

  • The Red Dory (1939)
  • The Owen Boys (1947)
  • Island Summer (1949)
  • Thad Owen (1950)
  • Tall Ships (1950)
  • His Indian Brother (1955)
  • The Surprise of Their Lives (1957)

"Herbert" series

  • Herbert (1950)
  • Herbert Again (1951)
  • More Fun With Herbert (1954)
  • Herbert's Homework (1960)
  • Herbert's Space Trip (1965)
  • Herbert's Stilts (1972)

Non-fiction Works

  • The Story of Lafayette (1952)
  • The Story of Mad Anthony Wayne (1953)
  • The Little Marquise: Madame Lafayette (1957)
  • The Seine, River of Paris (1962)
  • Last Queen of Hawaii: Liliuokalani (1963)
  • The Years Between: Washington at Home at Mount Vernon, 1783-1789 (1969).

Selected Resources

Wood, Esther (1905 - 2002)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Wood (born 2 Sept. 1905), a descendant of pre-1790 settlers who came to the Eastern Maine towns of Ellsworth, Deer Isle, and Blue Hill, and a Blue Hill resident until her death, began her history teaching career at the Gorham Normal School (now the University of Southern Maine) in 1930. She continued at the institution, with its myriad name changes, until her retirement in 1972.

She was a graduate of Blue Hill's George Stevens Academy in 1922, Colby College in 1926, and Radcliffe College in 1929.

In retirement Wood published four books, all of which focused on the social history of the Blue Hill region.

Miss Wood was also a regular contributor to the Christian Science Monitor and the Ellsworth American.

Her dedication to teaching history has been recognized in a number of ways. George Stevens Academy has a lecture room named in her honor and the University of Southern Maine has Wood Hall. She was the recipient of the Blue Hill Chamber of Commerce 'Woman of the Year' award and has also been honored by the Maine School Superintendent's Association. In addition, she received an honorary doctorate from Colby College. In 1994, Miss Wood was inducted into the Maine Womens Hall of Fame.

In 2000 she established a $100,000 scholarship in memory of Edna Frances Dickey, a colleague and friend. The scholarship is awarded to qualifying students at the Lewiston Auburn Campus of the University of Southern Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Country Fare: Reminiscences and Recipes from a Maine Childhood (1976)
  • Saltwater Seasons: Recollections of a Country Woman (1980)
  • Hannah: Reminiscences of an 1850 Childhood (1982)
  • Deep Roots: A Maine Legacy (1990)

Selected Links

Wood, Monica (1953 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Monica Wood, born in Mexico, Maine (16 August, 1953), is a long-time Portland resident.

She began her writing career in her late 20s as a short story writer. Her stories have been included in a number of anthologies, including Pushcart Prize Anthology 1999 and Best American Short Stories 1997.

In addition to writing fiction, Wood also presents workshops in which she teaches beginning writers how to improve their short stories and novels. She also has published a writer's guide as an outgrowth of these workshops. She has published three anthologies/teachers' guides whose purpose is to promote the inclusion of contemporary fiction in the junior high and high school curriculum.

Selected Bibliography

Novels

  • Secret Language (1993)
  • My Only Story (2000)
  • Any Bitter Thing (2005)

Short Stories

  • Ernie's Ark (2002)

Non-fiction

  • Description (1995)
  • Short Takes (1992)
  • 12 Multicultural Novels (1997)
  • The Best of S. E. Hinton (1999)
  • The Pocket Muse: Ideas and Inspirations for Writing (2002)
  • The Pocket Muse: Endless Inspiration (2006)
  • When We Were the Kennedys: A Memoir from Mexico (2012) winner, Maine Literary Awards Book Award for Memoir

Wood, Sally (1759 - 1855)

Genre: General Fiction

Sally (Sarah) Wood is considered Maine's first woman novelist and America's first gothic novelist.

She was born in York on 1 Oct. 1759. Until she was 19, she, her parents and her siblings lived with her grandfather, Judge Jonathan Sayward, one of the most affluent men in Maine. At 19, she married Richard Keating, a law clerk in her grandfather's office. When he died five years later (1783), she had two young daughters and was pregnant with a third child, a son.

Wood's first novel was published in 1800. It was a melodrama set in France and focused on the activities of the Free Society of the Illuminati.

She published her second novel in 1801. A fictional account of the real 1796 Yazoo land frauds, it tells the story of the schemer Dorval's role in the Georgia land speculation that involved bribes to state legislators.

In 1804, Mrs. Keating married her second husband, General Abiel Wood, and moved to Wiscasset.

After he died in 1811, Sally, now Madame Wood, went to live in Portland.

Wood, desiring anonymity, wrote and published under pseudonyms. On the title pages of her first four books, she was identified as either "A Lady" or "A Lady from Massachusetts." Since her last book was published after Maine became a state in 1820, she was identified as "A Lady from Maine" on its title page.

Sally Sayward Barrell Keating Wood died on 6 January 1855.

Bibliography

  • Julia and the Illuminated Baron, A Novel: Founded on Recent Facts, Which Have Transpired in the Course of the Late Revolution of Moral Principles in France (1800)
  • Dorval: or, The Speculator: a Novel, Founded on Recent Facts (1801)
  • Amelia, or The Influence of Virtue: An Old Man's Story (1802)
  • Ferdinand and Elmira: A Russian Story (1804)
  • Tales of the Night (1827)

Selected Resources

Selected Resources

Cooney, Ellen (1952 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

Born in Clinton, Massachusetts, short story writer and novelist Ellen Cooney received her M.A. in English from Clark University in 1978. She now lives in Phippsburg, Maine and Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Ms. Cooney has contributed to a number of periodicals, including "New Yorker", "Glimmer Train", "Fiction", "Epoch", "Ontario Review", "Story" and "Literary Review". She has taught at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Boston College, University of Maine at Orono, Harvard University and Radcliffe College.

Selected Bibliography

  • Lambrusco, (2008)
  • A Private Hotel for Gentle Ladies, (2005)
  • Gun Ball Hill: a Novel, (2004)

Costanza, Stephen ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Stephen Costanza, author and illustrator of children's books, lives in Belfast, Maine. He spent some of his youth in Cherry Hill, New Jersey studied music theory and composition at Syracuse University, and is a University of the Arts (Philadelphia) alumnus who is also a musician. Some of his other jobs have included graphic artist, ragtime and classical pianist, and designer of merchandise for sports teams.

His artwork has appeared in magazines, newspapers, advertising and text books. He was invited to exhibit illustrations at the Bologna Children's Book Fair in Italy in 2000. His work has also been exhibited at the Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland. Costanza is active in the arts community in the midcoast Maine area.

Selected Bibliography

Illustrator

  • Noodle Man: The Pasta Superhero (2002), written by April Pulley Sayre, featuring Al Dente, who wants to do anything except work in the family pasta deli business
  • Just Because/Shane's Best Week Ever! (2004), a book containing two short stories about foster families by Jan Riddle, part of the Kits for Kids series, based in Camden, Maine.

Writer and Illustrator

  • Mozart Finds a Melody (2004), a fictionalized tale of how Mozart wrote his "Piano Concerto no. 17 in G Major" with inspiration from a pet starling.

Cote Robbins, Rhea (1953 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Cote Robbins was raised in Waterville, Maine, attended the Univ. of Maine -- first as an Art major at the Presque Isle campus, then on a bilingual education scholarship, and finally to complete her M.A. in Liberal Studies. She lives in Brewer with her husband.

Robbins was raised speaking French and English at home and has spent her adult life studying her Franco-American roots. After briefly teaching high school, she worked as editor of an international, bilingual socio-cultural journal called Le FORUM (formerly Le F.A.R.O.G.) at the Franco-American Center from 1986-1996. She is the founder and director of the Franco-American Women's Institute, and she teaches courses at the Univ. of Maine in Franco-American women's experiences. She is also the author of numerous essays, poems, and book reviews in over 20 journals, newspapers, and anthologies.

Selected Bibliography

  • Wednesday's Child (1997/1999; 1997 winner of the Maine Chapbook Award for Selected creative non-fiction
  • I Am Franco-American and Proud of It: An Anthology of Writings of Franco-American Women (1995; designer and co-editor)
  • Women and Class a bibliography
  • Franco-American Health-Related Bibliography (1987/1989)
  • Canuck and Other Stories by Camille Lessard Bissonette (editor, 2006)

Selected Resources

Laux, Dorianne (1952 - )

Genre: Poetry

Dorianne Laux (pronounced "Locks") is a poet who lives in Raleigh, North Carolina, where she serves among the faculty at North Carolina State University's MFA Program. Of Irish, French, and Algonquin Indian heritage, she was born in Augusta, Maine. Much of her childhood manifests in her poems, some of which explore the physical and sexual abuse inflicted on her by her mother's male companions.

Laux worked as a gas station attendant and manager, sanatorium cook, maid, laundry attendant, and doughnut holer before moving to Berkeley, California, in 1983, where she began to write seriously.

A single parent, she graduated with honors from Mills College (1988, B.A. English) when her daughter was nine.

Laux received a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts (1990) as well as a Bread Loaf Fellowship (1990) and a Pushcart Prize (1986), and one of her poems is included in Best American Poetry (1999).

Selected Bibliography

  • Awake (1990), nominated for the San Francisco Bay Area Book Critics Award for Poetry.
  • What We Carry (1994; American Poets Continuum, Vol. 28) finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry in 1994.
  • Smoke (2000; American Poets Continuum, Vol. 62)
  • Facts About the Moon: Poems (2006)
  • The Poet's Companion: A Guide to the Pleasure of Writing Poetry (1997) with Kim Addonizio
  • Three West Coast Women (1983)with Kim Addonizio and Laurie Duesing
  • Only As The Day Is Long : New And Selected Poems (2020)

Selected Links

Finkelstein, Claudia (1944 - 2005)

Genre: General Fiction

Cape Elizabeth resident Claudia Finkelstein, who was born in Montreal, Quebec, was a 1966 Colby College graduate, majoring in psychology and American literature. She earned a master's degree in clinical psychology from the University of Maine. She was from 1993 until her death employed as school psychologist in the Portland School Department. She was well known as a jazz vocalist, performing throughout New England as a vocalist for the Joy Spring Jazz Quartet and with many other groups.

Selected Bibliogrpahy

  • Imperfect Strangers 2001. Its focus is the relationship between a teenage boy, who kills a policemen during a crime, and his court appointed lawyer.

Coursen Jr, Herbert (1932 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

An ex-fighter pilot, a prolific poet, and a Shakespearean scholar, Herb Coursen was born in Newark, NJ. He taught at New Hampshire College and Westfield College before moving to Maine to teach at Bowdoin in 1964. Retired in 1991, Coursen lives in Brunswick.

Dr. Coursen received his B.A. from Amherst College in 1954, a Masters in 1962 from Wesleyan and Ph.D. from the University of Connecticut in 1965. Highlights of his career include teaching various years from 1965 to 1980 in the Upward Bound program; serving as director of the National Endowment for the Humanities summer seminars, 1985-90; and, consulting editor in Shakespeare at Princeton University, Bucknell University and the University of Georgia.

Awards include the Ford Foundation fellowship, 1969-71; Folger Library fellowship, 1970-71; Percy Bysshe Shelley Lifetime Achievement Award, 1991; Poet Chapbook award, 1991; and, the Chester Jones Foundation award, 1992.

Selected Bibliography

  • Contemporary Shakespeare Production, (2010)
  • Even in Dreams, (2008)
  • Recall: New & Collected Poems, 1967-2008, (2008)
  • Storm Warnings: a 21st Century Novel, (2008)
  • To Raise Another World: a Sequel: the Eighth and Another in the Archerland Series, (2008)
  • Country Matters, (2006)
  • Shakespeare Translated: Derivatives On Film and TV, (2005)
  • The Blind Prophet of Archerland, (2004)

Flewelling, Lynn (1958 - )

Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy

Born in Presque Isle, and a graduate of the University of Maine Presque Isle, Flewelling writes fantasy books. Her books are all set in the Nightrunner World.

Selected Bibliography

  • Luck in the Shadows (1996)
  • Stalking Darkness (1997)
  • Traitor's Moon (1999)
  • The Bone Doll's Twin (2001)
  • Hidden Warrior (2003)
  • The Oracle's Queen (2006)
  • Shadows Return (2008)
  • The White Rad (2010)

Selected Resources

Cowan, Mary (1939 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Cowan was born in Portland, graduated from Westbrook High School and Bates College (1961), and lives now with her husband in Standish. She has completed basic and advanced courses at the Institute of Children's Literature. She has published over 50 stories and articles in children's magazines such as Highlights, Cobblestone, Faces, Jack and Jill and Children's Digest. She won the 1999 Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators Work-in-Progress grant. Cowan makes presentations and leads workshops for elementary school groups, and she also speaks to community groups.

Selected Bibliogrpahy

  • Ice Country: One Boy's Adventure in the Arctic with Commander Donald MacMillan (1995)
  • Timberrr!...A History of Logging in New England (2003)

Selected Resources

Cowen-Fletcher, Jane ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Jane Cowen-Fletcher's children's picture books have been recommended reading for many groups of children, from those who have a parent with a physical disability to those whose parents want to assure them that they are protected. Cowen-Fletcher lives in South Berwick, Maine, and serves on the South Berwick Public Library Planning Task Force. She was a Peace Corps volunteer in Benin from 1981-1983.

Selected Bibliography

  • It Takes A Village (1993/1994) is based on the African proverb and concept that child-rearing is a community activity. It won the African Studies Association's Younger Children's Book Award and was nominated for the Washington Children's Choice Picture Book Award.
  • Mama Zooms (1993/1996), about a mother in a speedy wheelchair
  • Baby Angels (1996/1997), about guardian angels that watch over a child
  • Farmer Will (2001), about a little boy and his beloved farm animal toys
  • I Love You, Baby, from Head to Toe! (2004; by Karen Padell, illus. by Cowen-Fletcher)
  • Nell's Elf (2006), about a bored child who creates an elf for a playmate.

Fisher, Jonathan (1768 - 1847)

Genre: Illustrator, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Jonathan Fisher preacher, artist, inventor, scholar, writer was born in Braintree, Massachusetts, and was a 1792 Harvard graduate. While at Harvard he developed his own method of shorthand that he continued to use in most of his writing. In 1797 the Congregational Church in Blue Hill, Maine asked him top become minister. He was paid $200 plus 15 cords of wood for the year and given 300 acres of woodland and a barn.

His first house, which he built with the help of his congregation, was completed in 1797, with a substantial addition in 1817. This later became the ell of an addition that still stands and is open for tours.

Although he was noted for his quiet personality, Fisher had strength of character and direction that made him a force in the town. He was one of the founders of the town library and was also involved in obtaining a land grant for the town academy. He was one of the founders and long-time trustees of the Bangor Theological Seminary. The seminary has an endowed chair, the Jonathan Fisher Professor of Christian Education, in his honor.

Selected Bibliography

  • Scripture Animals; A Natural History of the Living Creatures Named in the Bible (1834/1972) is noted for its delightful illustrations. It is one of the 100 books included in the book/exhibit, The Mirror of Maine
  • 'Two Elegies on the Deaths of Mrs. Marianne Burr, Who Died of a Consumption, Jan. 2, 1795; and of Mrs. Rebekah Walker, Who Died of the Same Disorder, Jan. 27, 1795. Aged 23' (1796)
  • 'A Short Essay on Baptism, designed for the Benefit of Common Readers' (1817)
  • Short Poems: Including a Sketch of the Scriptures to the Book of Ruth; Satan's Great Devise, or Lines on Intemperance; I and Conscience, or A dialogue on Universalism; and a Few Others on Various Subjects (1827)

Selected Resources

  • Reverend Jonathan Fisher, of Blue Hill, Maine (1868),
  • Memoir of Rev. Jonathan Fisher of Blue Hill, Maine (1889),
  • Biographical Sketch of the Rev. Jonathan Fisher of Blue Hill, Maine (1945),
  • Jonathan Fisher, Maine Parson, 1768-1847, by Mary Ellen Chase (1948),
  • Versatile Yankee; the Art of Jonathan Fisher, 1768-1847 (1973)
  • Versatility Yankee Style: the Cultural Diversity of Rev. Jonathan Fisher,John H. Bellamy and the Hardy family (1977)
  • The Language of Jonathan Fisher, 1768-1847 (1985)
  • The Jonathan Fisher House website contains biographical information and links to examples of his work.

Flexner, Hortense (1885 - 1973)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, Poetry

Poet and playwright Hortense Flexner, called the "la grand poetess du Maine" by her friend Marguerite Yourcenar, was a thirty-plus-year summer visitor to Sutton Island, the third largest of the Cranberry Isles, off the coast of Mount Desert. Although she made only brief visits to the island after her husband's death in 1961, her emotional attachment to Sutton was so strong that both she and her husband, noted cartoonist Wyncie King (1884-1961), are buried in the Sutton Island cemetery.

Hortense Flexner was born to a prominent Louisville, Kentucky family. Flexner attended Bryn Mawr College for one year, then transferred to the University of Michigan from which she earned a B.A. (1907) and a M.A. (1910). The University of Louisville (KY) awarded her an honorary doctorate in 1971. For a brief time after college she was employed by the Louisville Herald. After marrying Wyncie King, she and King moved to Philadelphia where he was a cartoonist for the Saturday Evening Post and she was an editor. From 1926 to 1940 she taught at Bryn Mawr and later taught at Sarah Lawrence College from which she retired in 1950.

Throughout her teaching career her poetry was published in magazines such as Harper's, The Atlantic, The Masses, The New Republic, The New Yorker, and Poetry.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry

  • Clouds and Cobblestones 1920. (Poetry)
  • The Stubborn Root and Other Poems (1930)
  • North Window and Other Poems (1943)
  • Poems (1961)
  • Selected Poems (1963), with an introduction by English poet Laurie Lee
  • Presentation Critique d'Hortense Flexner Suivie d'un Choix de Poems (1969), edited by Marguerite Yourcenar, contains poems in English and French.
  • The Selected Poems of Hortense Flexner (1975)
  • Half a Star: Poems by Hortense Flexner - Poems for Sutton Island, 13 lyric poems, most of she wrote while staying on the island. The book is one of the significant Maine books listed in The Mirror Of Maine: One Hundred Books that Reveal the History of the State and the Life of the People (2001).

Children's Books Illustrated by King

  • Chipper (1941)
  • The Wishing Window (1942)
  • Puzzle Pond (1948)

Plays

  • Voices (1916)
  • Mahogany (1921)
  • The Faun (1921)
  • The Broken God
  • The Road
  • The Little Miracle
  • Three Wise Men of Gotham

Selected Resources

  • Papers University of Louisville's special collections site

Flint, Margaret (1891 - 1961)

Genre: General Fiction

Margaret Flint was born at Orono, Maine, to Helen Leavitt and Walter Flint, a professor at the University of Maine. She spent her childhood in Orono, but moved to Port Deposit, Maryland, where she attended high school and served as class president all four years. She entered the University of Maine, attending classes there for three years until her marriage to Lester Warner Jacobs.

Flint's husband's work for the Army Corps of Engineers took them to Norfolk, Virginia, where she obtained a roll-top desk that served as her writing center. The family, which eventually included six children (including daughter Eleanor Jacobs Mitchell, who died in 1999), moved to Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, and Slidell, Louisiana. Her first novel, The Old Ashburn Place, earned a national prize for best novel of the year in 1937.

Flint's success was severely offset by the loss that same year of her husband to the long-term effects of WWI gassing. The cash prize of $10,000, however, enabled her to move the family back to Maine, a dream the couple had been cherishing. She renovated the former Pequawket Inn in West Baldwin, in an area which had been land-granted to her father's family after the French and Indian War.

Eight more novels and a flood of newspaper articles followed, but she never achieved her goal of self-sufficiency as a writer. People of all ages and backgrounds were attracted to her quiet hospitality, usually afternoon tea before the fire or bean supper on the porch. During WWII she was honored as a 5-star Mother. Her correspondence to and from these five children in the armed services formed the novel Dress Right, Dress.

Flint was active in social and civic affairs, taking notes for characters and dramatic scenes during town and Grange meetings. Some of these sketches are among her papers preserved in the library at Colby College in Waterville, Maine.

As a novelist, her forte was psychological insights into family and neighborhood relationships. She was also noted for her ability to convey the speech patterns of the small region between Sebago Lake and the New Hampshire border, the setting for most of her stories. Her essays on family life, the character of Maine, and on national events as they impacted local life appeared regularly in several Maine newspapers and in The Christian Science Monitor. A life-long member of the Christian Science church, she also wrote inspirational articles for the church's periodicals.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Old Ashburn Place (1936): Novel of bucolic Maine life
  • Valley of Decision (1937)
  • Deacon's Road (1938)
  • Breakneck Brook (1939)
  • Back O' the Mountain (1940)
  • Down the Road A Piece (1941)
  • October Fires (1941)
  • Enduring Riches (1942)
  • Dress Right, Dress: The Autobiography of a WAC (1943)

Selected Resources

Note: This biography of Margaret Flint Jacobs was prepared by her granddaughter, Sara Mitchell Barnacle, former librarian at Waldoboro, Maine.

Flora, Kate (1949 - )

Genre: Mystery, Non-Fiction

Flora grew up on a poultry farm in Union, where her mother, A. Carman Clark, lived until her death in 2005. Flora, who attended the University of Maine but graduated from Tufts (1971) and Northeastern Univ. (Law, 1976), lives on Bailey Island, Maine, with her husband, lawyer Kenneth Cohen. They have two sons, Max and Jake. Flora has written 15 mysteries, including her Thea Kozak series. Flora has taught mystery writing at the Cambridge Center for Adult Ed. and at the Cape Cod Writer's Conference. She frequently speaks on panels and to library organisations. In fact, her brother John Clark is a Maine librarian.

Selected Bibliography

  • Chosen for Death (1994)
  • Death in a Funhouse Mirror (1995)
  • Death at the Wheel (1996)
  • An Educated Death (1997/1999)
  • Death in Paradise (1998/2000)
  • Liberty or Death (2003)
  • Stalking Death (2008)
  • Playing God: A Joe Burgess Mystery (2006)
  • Steal Away (1998)
  • Silent Buddy (1995)
  • Seasmoke: Crime Stories by New England Writers (2006), co-edited along with Ruth McCarty, and Susan Oleksiw
  • Redemption: A Joe Burgess Mystery (2012) winner, 2013 Maine Literary Awards Book Award for Crime Fiction

Non-fiction

  • Finding Amy: The True Story of Murder in Maine 2006 with Joseph K. Loughlin

Selected Resources

Foerster, Richard (1949 - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet Richard Foerster was born in the Bronx, attended Fordham University and the University of Virginia, and moved to York Beach, Maine, in the mid-1980s. Foerster was editor of Chelsea literary magazine from 1994 to 2001 and currently edits Chautauqua Literary Journal. He is the recipient of Yaddo and MacDowell Colony fellowships, an NEA creative writing fellowship (1995), a Maine Arts Commission fellowship (1997), and was the 2000-2001 Amy Lowell Traveling Scholar. Besides his books, he's published poems in The Best American Poetry, Gettysburg Review, Southwest Review, New England Review, Shenandoah, Poetry magazine, and Southern Review.

Selected Bibliogrpahy

  • Sudden Harbor (1992)
  • Patterns of Descent (1993)
  • Trillium (1998; #46 of the American Poets Continuum series)
  • Double Going (2002)
  • The Burning of Troy (2006)

Selected Resources

Foster, Elizabeth (1905 - 1963)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Young Adult

Born in Cleveland, Ohio, Elizabeth Foster was the daughter of writer and playwright Maximilian Foster. She was educated at Miss Porter's School, Art Students League of America, and Columbia University. She was a freelance writer who published novels and short stories. Her stories were published in Redbook, Good Housekeeping, Home and Garden, and Trout and Stream.

Foster is buried in the family plot in Evergreen Cemetery, Rangeley.

Selected Resources

  • The Islanders (1946), in which she wrote about her maternal grandfather, Frederick Stoever Dickson, and the multi-generational family experiences at the summer place he built on a Rangely Lake island.
  • Singing Beach (1941)
  • Dirigo Point (1943)
  • The House at Noddy Cove (1947; juvenile).
  • The Days Between (1942)
  • Gigi, The Story of a Merry-Go-Round Horse (1943/1984; juvenile)
  • Gigi in America (1945/1984; juvenile), set in Old Orchard Beach
  • Children of the Mist (1961), biographical fiction about Lady Elizabeth Foster (1758-1824) and her relationship with the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire.

Foulger, Sarah (1955 - )

Genre: General Fiction

The Rev. Dr. Sarah Foulger, a Harpswell resident since 1984, is pastor of the Congregational Church of Boothbay Harbor. Ordained in 1979, she is a graduate of Princeton Theological Seminary (Master of Divinity) and Boston University (Doctor of Ministry). She earned her undergraduate degree from Hofstra University.

Selected Resources

  • Yards of Purple: Stories of Advent (1999)
  • No Revenge So Complete (2003)
  • KTSOOBL (2008)
  • Stories of Those Who Encountered Jesus O'er All the Weary World: Stories for Advent and Christmas (2017)

Crossman, David (1951 - )

Genre: Mystery, Young Adult

Mystery writer David A. Crossman is a Vinalhaven native, born in 1951. An advertising and television writer, producer, musician and composer, he and his family currently live in Nashville, TN.

Crossman published his first book in 1994. Unlike his other mysteries which have a Maine island setting, his first novel was set on an academic campus. Crossman is also the creator of Winston Crisp, a retired National Security agent and crime solver.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Legend of Burial Island: a Bean & Ab Mystery, (2009)
  • The Mystery of the Black Moriah: [a Bean & Ab Mystery], (2002)
  • The Dead of Winter: a Winston Crisp Maine Island Mystery, (1999)
  • The Secret of the Missing Grave, (1999) (YA)
  • A Show of Hands, (1997)
  • Murder In a Minor Key, (1994)

Crouch, Terry (1947 - )

Genre: Poetry

Terry Crouch, who also writes as Terrell Hunter-was born in Memphis, TN, and has lived in Garland, ME since 1973. Having obtained his M.A. at the University of Maine at Orono in 1988, he has gone on to instruct writing there as well. His primary works are poetry.

Selected Bibliography

  • Down On the Margin: Selected Poems, (1996), winner of the 8th annual Jack Kerouac Literary Prize
  • Bite the Night: Selected Poems, (1992)
  • Fur, (1992)
  • Day Dreaming at Night, (1988)

Selected Resources

Maine Poetry Website

Cummings, Rebecca (1944 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

Born in South Paris, Cummings attended the Univ. of Maine at Orono where she received her bachelors and masters degrees. Her stories center on Maine's Finnish community. She won first place in the 1984 Maine Arts Commission fiction chapbook contest.

Selected Bibliography

  • Kaisa Kilponen (1985)
  • Turnip Pie, and Other Stories (1986)

Gage, Carolyn (1952 - )

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film

Carolyn Gage, a lesbian-feminist playwright, performer, director, and activist, was born in Richmond, Virginia, and now lives in Portland, Maine. She received both her B.A. and M.A. in Theatre Arts from Portland State University in Portland, Oregon, in 1982 and 1984 respectively. She has taught Playwriting and Lesbian Poetry in the University of Southern Maine Continuing Eduction Program, and since 1999 has toured regularly as a lecturer, workshop presenter, and resident artist at colleges and universities. She was visiting professor at Bates Collegein 1998-1999 and adjunct professor at the Univ. of Southern Maine in 1998. She was also founder and director of Cauldron & Labrys Productions in Portland, Maine (2001-2005), director and resident playwright for the League of Lesbian Actors in Santa Rosa, CA (1992-1993), and founder and artistic director for other theatre companies from 1985 to 1991.

Gage tours in her award-winning, one-woman show, The Second Coming of Joan of Arc, which has been the subject of a feature on National Public Radio, and was produced in Brazil in 2002. She's received a number of grants and awards, including the Oregon Playwrights Award from the Oregon Institute of Literary Arts, awards from the Maine Arts Commission and the Oregon Arts Commission, and a research grant in 2002-2003 from the Maine Women Writers' Collection at the University of New England. In 2002, she received the Jeanine Rae Award for the Advancement of Women's Culture from Women in the Arts.

She has been published in the Dramatists Guild Quarterly, Sinister Wisdom, Lesbian Ethics, The Lesbian Review of Books, The Harvard Gay and Lesbian Review, The Michigan Quarterly Review, and off our backs.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Second Coming of Joan of Arc and Other Plays (1994; national finalist for the 1995 Lambda Literary Awards in Drama)
  • Take Stage! How To Direct and Produce A Lesbian Play (1997)
  • Like There's No Tomorrow: Meditations for Women Leaving Patriarchy (1997).
  • Monologues and Scenes for Lesbian Actors (1999)
  • Ten Short Plays by Carolyn Gage (2006)
  • The Princess of Pain (2006; a novella, with illustrations by Sudie Rakusin), in Harrington Lesbian Fiction Quarterly
  • The Anastasia Trials in the Court of Women
  • Coming About; Esther and Vashti;
  • Ugly Ducklings (nominated by the American Theatre Critics Association for the ATCA/Steinberg New Play Award)
  • The Last Reading of Charlotte Cushman (national winner of the $3000 Arch and Bruce Brown Foundation Grant for best play about a lesbian historical figure)
  • The Parmachene Belle (won the Maine Playwrights Award, Acorn Acting School, Portland, Maine)
  • The Poorly-Written Play Festival (winner of the 2005 Maine Short Play Festival, Portland, Maine)

Selected Resources

Gallant, Roy (1924 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Roy Gallant was born in Portland, Maine, where he attended Deering High School. After navigating B-24s in World War II, he attended Bowdoin College, majoring in English, minoring in philosophy and science, and receiving a B.A. in 1948. He attended Columbia University, studying journalism and earning an M.S. (1949).

Gallant, called "one of the deans of American science writers for children" by School Library Journal has had many jobs that involve both writing and science from staff writer for Science Illustrated and Boys' Life in the late 1940's to directing the Southworth Planetarium in Portland.

In the early 1970s, Gallant returned to Maine to live in a large house on a lake near Rangeley. He has taught at the University of Southern Maine and in the natural sciences division at the Maine College of Art. He has written a number of articles about his travels in 1992 to Siberia, where he became the first American ever to visit the Tunguska site of the 1908 meteorite catastrophe; he's also visited the Sikhote-Alin, Chinge, and Pallas meteorite sites there. Besides his books, he contributes articles to magazines and encyclopedias.

Selected Bibliography

  • Exploring the Moon, 1955 ill. Lowell Hess)
  • Exploring Mars (1956 ill. Lowell Hess)
  • Exploring the Universe (1956 ill. Lowell Hess; won Thomas Alva Edison Foundation Award for best children's science book of the year)
  • Exploring the Weather (1957 ill. Lowell Hess)
  • Exploring Chemistry (1958; ill. Lee Ames)
  • Exploring the Planets (1958 ill. John Polgreen)
  • Exploring the Sun (1958; ill. Lee J. Ames)
  • Man's Reach into Space (1959; ill. Lee J. Adams)
  • Exploring under the Earth: The Story of Geology and Geophysics (1960; ill. John Polgreen)
  • The ABC's of Astronomy: An Illustrated Dictionary (1962; ill. John Polgreen)
  • Antarctica (1962)
  • The ABC's of Chemistry: An Illustrated Dictionary (1963)
  • Weather (1966)
  • Discovering Rocks and Minerals; A Nature and Science Guide to Their Collection and Identification (1967; with Christopher J. Schuberth)
  • How Life Began: Creation Versus Evolution (1975)
  • Memory: How it Works and How to Improve It (1980/1985)
  • Lost Cities (1985; First Books)
  • Rainbows, Mirages, and Sundogs: The Sky as a Source of Wonder (1987)
  • Before the Sun Dies: The Story of Evolution (1989)
  • Earth: The Making of a Planet (1997/1998; with Christopher J. Schuberth)
  • Geysers: When Earth Roars (1997; First Books Earth & Sky Science)
  • Early Humans (1999/2000; The Story of Science series)
  • Earth's History (Earth Science Series, 2002)
  • Water: Our Precious Resource (2003)

Selected Resources

Froncek, Thomas ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Journalist, editor, and sailor Tom Froncek lives in Brunswick, Maine, with his wife Ellen, and sails out of Mere Point. Before living in Maine, the Fronceks lived in Rockland County in New York's Hudson River Valley. Froncek grew up in Wisconsin, among other places.

Froncek's articles have appeared in American Heritage, Good Old Boat, The Christian Science Monitor, The Village Voice, and The Country Journal, among others. He has been a member of The International Freedom-to-Publish Committee of the Association of American Publishers.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Splendid Madness: A Man, A Boat, A Love Story (2004), an account of his late blooming love affair with sailing.
  • Home Again, Home Again: A Son's Memoir (1996), about his ambivalent relationship with his father, Walter
  • Paying the Price: Freedom of Expression in Turkey, a 39-page booklet written by Lois Whitman and Froncek in 1989 after the two traveled to Turkey on a Helsinki Watch mission in October 1988
  • Take Away One: The True Story of a Mother Forced to Kidnap Her Own Child (1985), about a child custody kidnapping involving an American mother and a Yugoslav father.
  • Sail, Steam And Splendour: A Picture History Of Life Aboard The Transatlantic Liners, editor, written by Byron S. Miller (1977);
  • The City of Washington: An Illustrated History, editor, by The Junior League of Washington (1977/1992)
  • Voices from the Wilderness: The Frontiersman's Own Story (1974/1983; wrote introduction), a collection of 27 accounts by frontiersmen and plainsmen that cover 'The Appalachians and beyond 1755-1825' and 'The Missouri and beyond 1808-1870'
  • The Northmen, published as part of Time Life's Emergence of Man series (1974)
  • The Horizon Book of the Arts of Russia (1970)
  • The Horizon Book of the Arts of China <1969)

Garfield, Henry ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Young Adult

Belfast resident Henry Garfield has published a series of young adult books (ages 12+) featuring Cyrus 'Moondog' Nygerski, a California bus driver who claims to be a werewolf. Garfield, who moved back to Maine in 2000 after living 16 years in San Diego, grew up in Blue Hill, spent a year at the University of Maine, and had his first writing job at the Ellsworth American newspaper. Besides writing books, he's also a part-time teacher at Unity College. He's a great-great-grandson of U.S. president James A. Garfield.

selected Bibliography

  • Moondog (1995)
  • Room 13 (1997), described as 'a literary ghost story and crime novel with a werewolf....The tale of a young woman who battles a force of ultimate evil in a small California town classroom
  • Tartabull's Throw (2001), a mystery/suspense thriller set during the 1967 baseball season, when the Boston Red Sox battled three other teams for the American League pennant -- in this book, Cyrus meets up with Cassandra, who lives on Deer Isle, Maine
  • The Last Voyage of John Cabot (2004), a young adult historical novel.

Lawrence, Margaret ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Margaret Lawrence writes historical fiction; three historical mysteries were set in fictional, post-Revolutionary Rufford, Maine.

She grew up with her grandmother in a 120-year old house surrounded by the history of her ancestors.

She is a trained researcher, has been a professor of English, a Woodrow Wilson Fellow, and has been a finalist for the Edgar, the Agatha and the Anthony and for the Blackburn Prize in Drama. In addition to being a book author, she has worked off-Broadway and for network television.

Selected Bibliography

  • Hearts and Bones (1996)
  • Blood Red Roses (1997)
  • The Burning Bride (1998)
  • The Iceweaver (2000)
  • Roanoke (2009)

Gay Jr, Andrew (1927 - 2004)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, Poetry

Doctor, playwright, and poet Andrew J. (Andy) Gay, Jr. was born in Alabama and received his medical degree from the University of Alabama in 1955. A neuro-ophthalmologist, professor, and researcher, he was an editor of Clinical Concepts in Neuroophthalmology (1967) and was one of two writers of Eye Movement Disorders (1974). He was president of the New England Ophthalmological Society for five years. He and his wife Jeanine moved to 70-acre Fern Hill Farm in Belfast, Maine in 1971 where Gay practiced medicine until his retirement in 1991.

Selected Bibliography

  • Caitlin, a play based on the life of Caitlin Thomas, widow of poet Dylan Thomas, was telecast on Maine Public Television.
  • Greylight (1995) poetry
  • A Butterfly Careless (2001) poetry

Gerritsen, Tess (1953 - )

Genre: Mystery, Romance Novel

Best-selling author Tess (aka Teresa and Terry) Gerritsen was born on June 12, 1953 in San Diego, CA, and raised there. She received her B.A. in Anthropology from Stanford University (1975) and her M.D. from the University of California, San Francisco. She completed her internal medicine residency in Honolulu, Hawaii along with her husband, Jacob, also a physician. Gerritsen retired as an internist to Camden, Maine, to spend more time with her family and to write. Her play, 'Adrift,' became a 1993 CBS Movie of the Week.

Selected Bibliography

  • Adventure's Mistress 1985
  • Call After Midnight (1987)
  • Under the Knife (1990)
  • Never Say Die (1992) winner of the Romantic Times Reviewers' Choice Award that year in the Harlequin Intrigue category)
  • Thief of Hearts (1995)
  • Keeper of the Bride (1996)
  • Whistleblower (1992)
  • Peggy Sue Got Murdered (1994)
  • Harvest (1996), a medical thriller
  • Presumed Guilty (1997)
  • Life Support (1997)
  • Bloodstream (1998), set in Maine
  • In Their Footsteps (1999), not a medical thriller
  • Gravity (1999)
  • The Bone Garden (2007). Julia Hamill discovers bones of a long dead body in her Boston garden and a connection to an unsolved murder of the 1830s.
  • In their footsteps (2010)

Jane Rizzoli Series in Order

  • The Surgeon (2001)
  • The Apprentice (2002)
  • The Sinner (2003)
  • Body Double (2004)
  • Vanish: A Novel (2005)
  • The Mephisto Club (2006)
  • Keeping the Dead (2008)
  • Ice Cold (2010)
  • Last to Die: A Novel (2012)
  • Die Again (2014)

Anthologies

  • Impulse: Three Complete Novels (2000; with Barbara Delinsky and Linda Howard)
  • Heatwave (2000, with Linda Lael Miller and Barbara Delinsky)
  • Stolen Memories (2001, with Jayne Ann Krentz and Stella Cameron)

Selected Resources

Woodard, Colin (1968 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Colin Woodard, a Maine native (born 3 Dec. 1968) who grew up in Strong, ME and lives in Portland, is a journalist who specializes in global affairs. He writes regularly for The Christian Science Monitor and The Chronicle of Higher Education, and has been a frequent contributor to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. He is also the author of three non-fiction books.

Woodard graduated with a B.A. from Tufts University in 1991 and with an M.A. in international relations from the University of Chicago, where he was awarded the 1997 Morton Kaplan prize for his thesis on the Balkans.

He has traveled extensively, living in Budapest, Zagreb and Sarajevo for more than four years. He is a 2004 recipient of the Jane Bagley Lehman Award for Public Advocacy, given by the Tides Foundation for his global reporting on environmental issues.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ocean's End: Travels Through Endangered Seas (2000)
  • The Lobster Coast: Rebels, Rusticators, and the Struggle for a Forgotten Frontier (2004)
  • The Republic of Pirates: Being the True and Surprising Story of the Caribbean Pirates and the Man Who Brought Them Down (2007)
  • Feeling the Heat: Dispatches from the Frontlines of Climate Change (2004) (article contributor)

Selected Links

Gibbons, Gail (1944 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Gibbons is a prolific writer/illustrator of children's non-fiction books. She was born in Oak Park IL and received a BFA from the University of Illinois. She and her husband, Kent Ancliffe, and their dog and cats live in Corinth VT in a solar house on 300 acres. Since 1986 they have spent several months of the year on Matinicus Island. Many of her titles have been designated "Outstanding Science Trade Books" by the National Science Teachers Asssociation. Gibbons received the Washington Post Children's Book Guild Award for overall contribution to children's nonfiction, as well as the 2010 Regina Medal of the Catholic Library Association. She is also the recipient of the Katahdin Award 2009, a lifetime achievement award presented by the Maine Library Association in recognition of an outstanding body of work.

Selected Bibliography

  • Willy and His Wheel Wagon (1975)
  • Clocks and How They Go (1979)
  • Locks and Keys (1980)
  • Trucks (1981)
  • Tool Book (1982)
  • The Post Office Book: Mail and How it Moves (1982/86/99)
  • Sun Up, Sun Down (1983/1999)
  • Boat Book (1983)
  • Paper, Paper Everywhere (1983/1997/1999; - about the pulp industry)
  • The Seasons of Arnold's Apple Tree (1984/1999)
  • Fire! Fire! (1984/1986)
  • Playgrounds (1985)
  • Check It Out: The Book About Libraries (1985)
  • The Milk Makers (1985/87)
  • Lights! Camera! Action!: How a Movie is Made (1985/89)
  • From Path to Highway: The Story of the Boston Post Road (1986)
  • Up Goes the Skyscraper! (1986/1990)
  • The Pottery Place (1987)
  • Zoo (1987/1999)
  • Monarch Butterfly (1989)
  • Catch the Wind: All About Kites (1989)
  • Beacons of Light: Lighthouses (1990
  • How A House Is Built (1990/1996/1999)
  • The Puffins are Back (1991)
  • Surrounded By Sea: Life on a New England Fishing Island (1991/2006)
  • Whales (1991)
  • Recycle!: A Handbook for Kids (1992/1999)
  • Say Woof!: A Day in the Life of a Country Vet (1992)
  • Stargazers (1992/1999)
  • Frogs (1993/1999)
  • Caves and Caverns (1993/1996)
  • Pirates: Robbers of the High Seas (1993/1999)
  • The Planets (1993/2005)
  • Spiders (1993/1999)
  • Wolves (1994/1997)
  • County Fair (1994)
  • Christmas on an Island (1994; Manticus Island, to be exact)
  • Nature's Green Umbrella: Tropical Rain Forests (1994/1999)
  • Knights in Shining Armor (1995/1998/1999)
  • Cats (1996/1998)
  • Gulls...Gulls...Gulls (1997/2001)
  • The Moon Book (1997/1998)
  • The Honey Makers (1997/2000)
  • Click!: A Book About Cameras and Taking Pictures (1997)
  • Marshes and Swamps (1998/1999)
  • Soaring with the Wind: Bald Eagles (1998)
  • Pigs (1999/2000)
  • The Pumpkin Book (1999/2000/2002) - - - Bats (1999/2000)
  • Rabbits, Rabbits, and More Rabbits (2000/2001)
  • My Baseball Book (2000)
  • Behold... the Unicorns! (2001)
  • The Berry Book (2002)
  • Tell Me, Tree: All About Trees for Kids (2002)
  • Mummies, Pyramids and Pharaohs: A Book About Ancient Egypt (2002/2004)
  • The Quilting Bee (2003)
  • Grizzly Bears (2003)
  • Chicks & Chickens (2005)
  • From Sheep To Sweater (2006)
  • Ice Cream: The Full Scoop (2006)
  • The Galaxies, Galaxies (2006)
  • Groundhog Day!: Shadow or No Shadow? (2007)
  • Coral Reefs (2007)
  • The Vegetables We Eat (2007)
  • Alligators and Crocodiles C2010)
  • Ladybugs (2012)
  • It's Raining! (2014)
  • Transportation! How People Get Around (2017)
  • Migration (2020)

Wormser, Baron (1948 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Wormser is a poet, born in Baltimore on 4 Feb. 1948 and raised there, lived for many years in Mercer, then in Hallowell, Maine. He lives in Cabot, VT.

He majored in English at Johns Hopkins University and received his M.A. in English from the University of California in 1970. He moved to Maine in 1971 and received his MLS from the University of Maine in 1973. He then worked as a librarian in Maine and taught at the University of Maine at Farmington.

He won Poetry magazine's Frederick Bock Prize in 1982. In 2000, he was named Maine's second Poet Laureate, his term ending in 2005.

Wormser is on the board of directors of the Robert Frost Place.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry

  • The White Words (1983)
  • Good Trembling (1985)
  • Atoms, Soul Music and Other Poems (1989)
  • When (1997)won the Kathryn A. Morton Prize in Poetry (1996)
  • Mulroney and Others: Poems (2000)
  • Subject Matter (2004)
  • Carthage (2005)
  • The Poetry Life; Ten Stories (2008)
  • Scattered Chapters: New and Selected Poems (2008)

Non-fiction

  • Teaching the Art of Poetry: The Moves (1999) with David Cappell
  • A Surge of Language: Teaching Poetry Day by Day (2004) with David Cappell
  • The Road Washes Out in Spring: A Poet's Memoir of Living Off the Grid (2006)

Selected Links

Gilman, Dorothy (1924 - )

Genre: Mystery

Born in New Brunswick, NJ, Gilman lives in Westport, Conn., and Portland, Maine. She began her career writing fiction for children and young adults under her former married name, Dorothy Gilman Butters. She is best known for adult mysteries, particularly the series featuring Emily Pollifax, a retired widow turned CIA agent. The Mystery Writers of America selected Gilman as the Grand Master for 2010, an award which "represents the pinnacle of achievement in mystery writing."

Selected Bibliography

  • Enchanted Caravan (1949/1954)
  • Papa Dolphin's Table (1955)
  • Girl in Buckskin (1956/1990/1994; Young Adult)
  • Ten Leagues to Boston Town (1962; historical fiction)
  • The Bells of Freedom (1963/1995; young adult, historical fiction)
  • Maze in the Heart of the Castle (1983/1991; Young Adult fantasy)
  • Uncertain Voyage (1967/1988/1990/2001-LP; mystery)
  • The Clairvoyant Countess (1975/1976/1987/1996; mystery)
  • A Nun in the Closet (1975/1986/1990/1993)
  • A New Kind of Country (1978/1979/1989/1991; autobiographical work about Gilman's life in a lobstering village in Nova Scotia)
  • The Tightrope Walker (1979/1980/1986/1992/1997; mystery)
  • Incident at Badamaya (1989/1990/1995; adventure, set in 1950s Burma)
  • Caravan (1992/1993; North African adventure story, set in 1914)
  • Kaleidoscope (2002; features Madame Karitska, from The Clairvoyant Countess)

Mrs. Pollifax Mysteries

  • The Unexpected Mrs. Pollifax (1966/1970/1972/1984/1985/1992/1998)
  • The Amazing Mrs. Pollifax (1970/1983/1985/1992)
  • The Elusive Mrs. Pollifax (1971/1983/1987/1988/1993)
  • A Palm for Mrs. Pollifax (1973/1983/1985)
  • Mrs. Pollifax on Safari (1977/1987)
  • Mrs. Pollifax on the China Station (1983/1984/1985)
  • Mrs. Pollifax and the Hong Kong Buddha (1985/1986)
  • Mrs. Pollifax and the Golden Triangle (1987/1989)
  • Mrs. Pollifax and the Whirling Dervish (1990/1991)
  • Mrs. Pollifax and the Second Thief (1993/1994/1995)
  • Mrs. Pollifax Pursued (1995) (set at a Maine carnival)
  • Mrs. Pollifax and the Lion Killer (1996/1997)
  • Mrs. Pollifax, Innocent Tourist (1997)
  • Mrs. Pollifax Unveiled (2000)

Selected Resources

Material from Maine State Library files

Gold, John (1962 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

John Gold is an Ohio native who grew up in New Hampshire and has lived in Maine since 1985.He is the author of several non-fiction books for children. Gold received a degree in zoology from the University of New Hampshire and is also a graduate of journalism program. He was a reporter and wire editor with the Journal Tribune in Biddeford and has contributed to many publications, including Business Digest and Commerical Fisheries News. He is a principal of Custom Communications and lives in Saco. Gold is an acive member of Saco Bay Trails, a nonprofit group dedicated to preserving and maintaining trails open to the public.

Selected Bibliography

  • Board of Education v. Pico 1982: Book Banning (1995; Supreme Court Decisions series)
  • Environments of the Western Hemisphere (1998; Comparing Continents series)
  • Heart Disease (1995/2000; Health Watch series)
  • Cancer (1997; 2001; Health Watch series)
  • Cerebral Palsy (2001; Health Watch series)
  • Maine Employers' Mutual Insurance Company, Memic, a Maine Miracle: The Success Story of Maine's Workers' Compensation Reforms (2003)

Gold, Susan (1949 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Young Adult

Susan Dudley Gold, a Maine native who lives in Saco, has written numerous books for children and young adults. She attended Brandeis University and graduated from the University of Southern Maine. She worked as a reporter for a daily newspaper, as managing editor of a statewide business magazine, and as a freelance journalist. She and her husband, John Gold, own and operate Custom Communications, a web design and desktop publishing business in Saco. In 2001, Gold received a Jefferson Award for community service in recognition of her work with a chronic pain support group, which she founded after being diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis in 1990.

Selected Bibliography

  • Shoes for Sport (1983; Technology: How Things Are Made series)
  • Passenger Pigeon (1989; Gone Forever series)
  • Toxic Waste (1990; Earth Alert series)
  • The Kennedy Space Center: Gateway to Space (1992;Adventures in Space series)
  • Indian Treaties (1997;Pacts & Treaties series)
  • Make Way for the Automobile: The History of the Maine Automobile Association, 1910-1997 (1998; with Jill Cournoyer)
  • The History of Union Wharf: 1793-1998 (1998; with Jill Cournoyer)
  • The Panama Canal Transfer: Controversy at the Crossroads (1999)
  • Blame it on El Niño (1999/2000)
  • Bipolar Disorder and Depression (2000; Health Watch series)
  • Maine Employers' Mutual Insurance Company, Memic, a Maine Miracle: The Success Story of Maine's Workers' Compensation Reforms (2003; with John Gold)
  • Gun Control (Open for Debate) (2004)
  • The Digestive and Excretory Systems (2004;Human Body Library series)
  • Engel v. Vitale: Prayer in the Schools (2006;Supreme Court Milestones series)
  • Scarborough at 350:linking the past to the present (2007, editor)

Goodkind, Terry (1948 - 2020)

Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy

Fantasy novelist and artist Terry Goodkind was born in Omaha, Nebraska.-and first visited Maine the summer he graduated from high school. In 1983 he moved to Mount Desert Island where he built the house in which he and his wife Jeri lived. Prior to the publication of his successful series word of Truth, Goodkind was employed as a carpenter, violin-maker, hypnotherapist, wildlife artist, and artifacts restorer.

His first novel, Wizard's First Rule, was auctioned in 1994 for the highest price paid for a first fantasy novel to that date. The central characters of the novel and all other novels in the series are Richard Cypher (Lord Rahl) and Kahlan Amnell (Mother Confessor), a strong female character whom Richard first meets when she is fleeing assassins from her home country. Throughout the series, Richard, who learns of and accepts his wizard heritage, and Kahlan fight the evil forces that threatened their land and people. The series has been adapted for television as Legend of the Seeker

Selected Bibliography

  • Wizard's First Rule (1994)
  • Stone of Tears (1995)
  • Blood of the Fold (1996)
  • Temple of the Winds (1997)
  • Soul of the Fire (1999)
  • Faith of the Fallen (2000)
  • The Pillars of Creation (2001)
  • Debt of Bones (2001), revised edition of a novella which first appeared in Legends, a 1998 fantasy anthology
  • Naked Empire (2003)
  • Chainfire (2005)
  • Phantom (2006)
  • Confessor (2007), the 12th and final novel of the Sword of Truth fantasy series.

Gosselin, Henry (1930? - )

Genre: General Fiction

Henry (Henri) Gosselin, of Harpswell, Maine, is a veteran journalist and author of two historical novels reflecting his Franco-American heritage. Gosselin, who received degrees from St. Anselm's College and Boston University, worked as editor of the Lisbon Enterprise, Lewiston's Maine Sunday News and Skowhegan's Somerset Reporter. He retired as the editor of Church World, Maine's Roman Catholic Diocesan Weekly. Gosselin has received Catholic Press Association awards as well as honorary degrees from St. Anselm's College, his alma mater, and St. Joseph's College in Standish, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • George Washington's French-Canadian Spy (1999) based on the author's ancestor Clement Gosselin
  • Eustache Lambert: Donne Extraordinaire - Dedicating his Life in the Service of the Huron Missions (2001)

Grant, Richard (1952 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Science Fiction/Fantasy

Grant was born in Norfolk, Va., attended the University of Virginia, and served in the Coast Guard. While best known as a writer of fantasy/science fiction, he is also a contributor to Down East magazine. He received a New England Journalism Award for Village Voice, a column in The Camden Herald. Grant has two children with writer Elizabeth Hand. He is a faculty member of the Watershed School in Rockland and lives in Rockport.

Selected Bibliography

  • Saraband of Lost Time(1985)
  • Rumors of Spring(1987
  • Views from the Oldest House(1989)
  • Through the Heart(1991)
  • Tex and Molly in the Afterlife (1996, fictitious Maine setting)
  • In the Land of Winter(1997)
  • Kaspian Lost(1999/2001)
  • At the shore: a Maine coastal garden(2005)
  • Another Green World(2006)

Graves, Sarah (1950? - )

Genre: Mystery

Wisconsin native Sarah Graves (pseudonym for Mary Squibb) moved to Eastport, Maine in 1996. She and her husband bought a dilapidated sea captain's house and their hands- on renovation provided background for her mystery series, Home Repair is Homicide.

Selected Bibliography

Home Repair is Homicide series

  • The Dead Cat Bounce (1998)
  • Triple Witch(1999)
  • Wicked Fix (2000)
  • Repair to Her Grave: A Mainely Murder Mystery (2001)
  • Wreck the Halls (2001, a Christmas mystery)
  • Unhinged (2003)
  • Mallets Aforethought (2004)
  • Tool & Die (2005)
  • Nail Biter (2006)
  • Trap Door (2006
  • The Book of Old Houses (2007)
  • A Face at the Window(2008)
  • Crawlspace (2010)
  • Dead Level (2011)
  • Knockdown: a Home Repair is Homicide Mystery (2011)
  • A Bat in the Belfry (2013)

Great North Woods series

  • Winter at the Door (2014)
  • The Girls She Left Behind (2016)

Death by Chocolate Mysteries

  • Death by Chocolate Cherry Cheesecake (2018)
  • Death by Chocolate Malted Milkshake (2019)
  • Death by Chocolate Frosted Doughnut (2020)

Selected Resources

Gray, T. M. (1963 - )

Genre: Horror

T.M. Gray was born on November 23, 1963, in Bar Harbor, Maine. She lives in the small fishing village of Birch Harbor(Gouldsboro), is married, and has two children. Gray has been fascinated by scary tales since grade school. She has written several novels and numerous short stories and often uses the Maine coast as a setting.

Selected Bibliography

  • Feast of Faust (2003), a collection of 45 horror stories
  • Mr. Crisper (2004)
  • The Ravenous (2004)
  • Ghosts of Eden (2005), a young woman returns to her childhood home of Bar Harbor after spending several years in a mental hospital
  • Ghosts of Maine (2008), a ghost hunter's guide to Maine, organized by county
  • New England Graveside Tales (2010)

Greenlaw, Linda (1960 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery, Non-Fiction

Greenlaw, a Connecticut native (born 22 Dec. 1960), grew up Topsham, Maine, and lives on Isle au Haut, where she works hauling lobster. She is the author of several bestselling books about commercial fishermen as well as a mystery series set on coastal Maine. Her ocean fishing career began as a summer job while attending Colby College. After graduation she worked her way from cook and deckhand to captain of a swordfishing boat. Her role in a boating incident was portrayed by Sebastian Junger in his book The Perfect Storm, which was made into a movie in 2000. Junger described Greenlaw as "one of the best captains, period, on the entire East Coast." Her boat, the Hannah Boden, was the sister ship to the Andrea Gail, which disappeared in the disastrous 1991 storm that was the focus of Junger's bestseller. After her mention in Junger's book, Greenlaw was approached to write the book that became The Hungry Ocean (1999), a story of one month-long swordfishing trip east of the Grand Banks of Newfoundland.

Greenlaw left the swordfishing business in the late 1990s to lobster from waters near her Maine island home but returned to swordfishing briefly -- as evidenced by her recent book Seaworthy. She received the U.S. Maritime Literature Award in 2003 and the New England Award for non-fiction in 2004.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Hungry Ocean (1999)
  • The Lobster Chronicles: Life on a Very Small Island (2002, about Isle Au Haut)
  • Fisherman are Liars: True Tales from the Dry Dock Bar (2004)
  • Recipes From a Very Small Island (2005, with her mother Martha Greenlaw)
  • Slipknot (2007, first in a mystery series featuring marine investigator Jane Bunker)
  • Fisherman's Bend (2008 second in Jane Bunker series)
  • Seaworthy:A Swordfish Captain Returns to the Seas (2010)
  • Lifesaving Lessons: Notes from an Accidental Mother (2013)

Grossinger, Richard (1944 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Science Fiction/Fantasy

Richard Grossinger, born in New York City (Nov.3,1944), lives in California and summers in Manset, Maine. He graduated from Amherst College and received his Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Michigan in 1975. His dissertation, The Strategy and Ideology of Lobster Fishing on the Back Side of Mt. Desert Island, Hancock County, Maine, is an ethnography incorporating economic and ecological studies of fishing communities. Grossinger and his wife, the poet and novelist Lindy Hough, co-founded Io, an alternative college literary magazine in 1964. A forerunner of Whole Earth Review, New Age, and Gnosis -- it was a counter-cultural mix of literature, science, and history. Grossinger and Hough also co-founded North Atlantic Books, publisher of alternative health, martial arts, and spiritual titles.

Selected bibliography

  • The Book of Being Born Again into the World (1974)
  • Book of the Cranberry Islands (1974; poems)
  • Planet Medicine: From Stone-Age Shamanism to Post-Industrial Healing (1980/1990; 1st in trilogy)
  • The Night Sky: The Science and Anthropology of the Stars and Planets (1981/1988/1992; 2nd in trilogy)
  • Planet Medicine: Origins (1990/2001)
  • Homeopathy: An Introduction for Skeptics and Beginners (1993)
  • Planet Medicine: Modalities (1995/2003;
  • New Moon (1996; memoir)
  • Out of Babylon: Ghosts of Grossinger's (1997; memoir)
  • On the Integration of Nature: Post 9-11 Biopolitical Notes (2005)
  • Migraine Auras: When the Visual World Fails (2006)

Kaler, James (1848 - 1912)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

James Otis Kaler, born in Winterport, wrote adventure and patriotic biographies that had great appeal for his boy readers. He wrote more than 150 children's books, many of which were in series and intended for classroom use. He used two pseudonyms, James Otis for most of his books, and Amy Prentice for books written for young readers.

At 13, Kaler left home to become a reporter in Boston. When he was only 16, he provided news coverage of Civil War battles and events. He continued in the newspaper profession as a writer and editor and then in 1881 published the book for which he is best known, Toby Tyler or Ten Weeks With the Circus. The book has remained in print and is available as a book on tape and was also produced by Disney as a movie in 1960.

In 1898, Kaler returned to Maine to become the first superintendent of schools for the city of South Portland that had just separated from Cape Elizabeth. The city later named an elementary school in his honor. In the early 1970s, Kaler's sons and grandchildren presented the city with a collection of Kaler manuscripts, books, and letters. The materials are located in the South Portland Public Library and can be viewed by scholars and interested readers.

In 1896, Kaler anonymously published The Story of American Heroism, a collection of letters written to him by Civil War Congressional Medal of Honor winners.
Extracts from the letters were extensively quoted in Joseph B. Mitchell's The Badge of Gallantry; Recollections of Civil War Congressional Medal of Honor Winners. (1968)

Selected Bibliography

  • Tim and Tip (1883)
  • An Emperor's Son (1884)
  • Left Behind (1885)
  • Silent Pete (1886)
  • The Castaways (1888)
  • Little Joe (1888)
  • A Runaway Brig (1888)
  • Jack the Hunchback (1892)
  • Josiah in New York (1893)
  • Teddy (1893)
  • The Search for the Silver City (1893)
  • Jenny Wren's Boarding House (1893)
  • The Adventures of a Country Boy at a Country Fair (1893)
  • The Boys' Revolt (1894)
  • Chasing a Yacht (1894)
  • An Island Refuge; Casco Bay in 1676 (1895)
  • With Lafayette at Yorktown (1895)
  • Ezra Jordan's Escape from the Massacre at Fort Loyall (1895)
  • Neal, The Miller, A Son of Liberty (1895)
  • The Boys of 1745 at the Capture of Louisbourg (1895)
  • How Tommy Saved the Barn (1895)
  • Andy's Ward (1895)
  • Jerry's Family (1895)
  • The Boy Captain (1896)
  • Wrecked on Spider Island (1896)
  • Under the Liberty Tree (1896)
  • On Schedule Time (1896)
  • Admiral J. of Spurwink (1896)
  • A Short Cruise (1896)
  • Teddy and Carrots, Two Merchants of Newspaper Row (1896)
  • At the Siege of Quebec (1897)
  • The Wreak of the Circus (1897)
  • With Washington at Monmouth (1897)
  • Sarah Dillard's Ride (1898)
  • The Boys of 98 (1898)
  • The Capture of the Laughing Mary (1898)
  • The Charming Sally, Privateer Schooner of New York (1898)
  • The Cruise of the Comet (1898)
  • Joel Harford (1898)
  • An Amateur Fireman (1898)
  • Dick in the Desert (1898)
  • With Warren At Bunker Hill (1898)
  • When Israel Putnam Served the King (1898)
  • Morgan, the Jersey Spy (1898)
  • A District Message Boy and a Necktie Party (1898)
  • A Traitor's Escape (1898)
  • Captain Tom (1899)
  • Telegraph Tom's Venture (1899)
  • Christmas at Deacon Hackett's (1899)
  • Chased Through Norway (1899)
  • Amos Dunkel, Oarsman (1899)
  • At the Siege of Havana (1899)
  • With the Swamp Fox (1899)
  • Corporal ‘Lige's Recruit (1899)
  • With Perry On Lake Erie (1899)
  • The Life Savers (1899)
  • Down the Slope (1899)
  • A Tory Plot (1899)
  • When Dewey Went To Manila (1899)
  • The Life of John Paul Jones (1900)
  • Armed Ship America (1900)
  • Aunt Hannah and Seth (1900)
  • The Defense of Fort Henry (1900)
  • With Preble at Tripoli (1900)
  • When We Destroyed the Gaspee (1901)
  • With the Regulators (1901)
  • Larry Hudson's Ambition (1901)
  • Inland Waterways (1901)
  • Lobster Catchers (1901)
  • With Porter in the Essex (1901)
  • The Story of Pemaquid (1902)
  • The Cruise of the Enterprise (1902)
  • Reuben Green's Adventures at Yale (1902)
  • With Rodgers on the President (1903)
  • Defending the Island; a Story of Bar Harbor in 1758 (1904)
  • With the Treasure-Hunters (1903)
  • The Minute Boys of the Mohawk Valley (1905)
  • When Washington served the King (1905)
  • Joy at the Fair (1906)
  • The Light Keepers (1906)
  • Commodore Barney's Young Spies (1907)
  • Aboard the Hylow on Sable Island Bank (1907)
  • The Wreck of the Ocean Queen (1907)
  • The Cruise of the Phoebe (1908)
  • Afloat in Freedom's Cause (1908)
  • Two Stowaways Aboard the Ellen Maria (1908)
  • The Sarah Jane, Dickey Dalton, Captain: a Story of Tugboating in Portland Harbor (1909)
  • The Minute Boys of New York City (1909)
  • Calvert of Maryland: A Story of Lord Baltimore's Colony (1910)
  • Mary of Plymouth: A Story of the Pilgrim Settlement (1910)
  • Peter of New Amsterdam: A Story of Old New York (1910)
  • Richard of Jamestown: A Story of the Virginia Colony (1910)
  • Ruth of Boston: A Story of the Massachusetts Bay Colony (1910)
  • Stephen of Philadelphia: A Story of the Penn's Colony (1910)
  • Mr. Stubbs's Brother: a Sequel to Toby Tyler (1910)
  • The Minute Boys of Boston (1910)
  • The Story of Old Falmouth (1910)
  • Geography of Maine (1910)
  • The Wireless Station at Silver Fox Farm (1910)
  • With Porter in the Essex (1910)
  • With the Regulators (1910)
  • Old Ben, The Friend of Toby Tyler and Mr Stubb's Brother (1911)
  • With Sherman to the Sea (1911)
  • Adventures in Mexico (1911)
  • Boy Scouts in the Maine Woods (1911)
  • The Camp on Indian Island (1911)
  • Hunting in Africa (1911)
  • Raising the Pearl (1911)
  • "Wanted", and Other Stories (1912)
  • The Wreck of the Princess (1912)
  • Hannah of Kentucky: A Story of the Wilderness Road (1912)
  • Benjamin of Ohio: A Story of the Settlement of Marietta (1912)
  • Seth of Colorado: A Story of the Settlement of Denver (1912)
  • Antoine of Oregon: A Story of the Oregon Trail (1912)
  • Martha of California: A Story of the California Trail (1913)
  • Philip of Texas: A Story of Sheep Raising in Texas (1913)
  • The Roaring Lions (1913)
  • Airship Cruising From Silver Fox Farm (1913)
  • Boy Scouts in a Lumber Camp (1913)
  • "Across the Range," and Other Stories (1914)
  • The Club at Crow's Corner (1915)
  • True Adventure Tales from American history in the Stirring Days of the Revolution (1924)

Written as Amy Prentice

  • Billy Goat's Story (1906)
  • The Brown Owl's Story (1906)
  • Bunny Rabbit's Story (1906)
  • Croaky Frog's Story (1906)
  • Frisky Squirrel's Story (1906)
  • Gray Goose's Story (1906)
  • Mouser Cat's Story (1906)
  • Plodding Turtle's Story (1906)
  • Quacky Duck's Story (1906)
  • Towser Dog's Story (1906)

Selected Links

Kellogg, Elijah (1813 - 1901)

Genre: Children's Literature

Portland-born Elijah Kellogg, Jr., was both a Congregationalist minister and the son of a minister. After graduating from Bowdoin in 1840 and Andover theological Seminary in 1847, Kellogg led churches in Harpswell (1844-54) and Topsham (1871-1901) and, in fact, there's an Elijah Kellogg Congregationalist Church in Harpswell now, named for him.

Kellogg didn't begin writing children's books until he was over 50 years old, but once he started, he was prolific! His books are considered "boys'" books and were written in several series.

Bibliography

Elm Island Series

  • The Ark of Elm Island (1868)
  • Charlie Bell: The Waif of Elm Island (1868/1896)
  • Lion Ben of Elm Island (1868)
  • The Boy Farmers of Elm Island (1869)
  • The Hard-Scrabble of Elm Island (1870)
  • The Young Ship-Builders of Elm Island (1870)

Pleasant Cove Series

  • Arthur Brown: The Young Captain (1870, vol. 1)
  • The Young Deliverers of Pleasant Cove (1871, vol. 2)
  • The Cruise of the Casco (1871, vol. 3)
  • The Child of the Island Glen (1872, vol. 4)
  • John Godsoe's Legacy (1873, vol. 5)
  • The Fisher Boys of Pleasant Cove (1874, vol. 6

Whispering Pine Series

  • The Spark of Genius; or, The College Life of James Trafton (1871)
  • The Sophomores of Radcliffe; or, James Trafton and His Bosom Friends (1871)
  • The Whispering Pine; or, the Graduates of Radcliffe Hall (1872)
  • Winning His Spurs; or, Henry Morton's First Trial (1872)
  • The Turning of the Tide; or, Radcliffe Rich and His Patients (1873)
  • A Stout Heart; or, the Student From Over the Sea (1873)

Forest Glen Series

  • Saved By the Wind; or, The Poor Boy's Future (1874, vol. 1)
  • Wolf Run; or, the Boys of the Wilderness (1875, vol. 2)
  • Brought to the Front; or, The Young Defenders (1875, vol. 3)
  • The Mission of Black Rifle; or, On the Trail (1876, vol. 4)
  • Forest Glen; or, the Mohawk's Friendship (1877, vol. 5), Burying the Hatchet; or, the Young Brave of the Delawares (1878, vol. 6)

Good Old Times Series

  • Good Old Times; or, Grandfather's Struggle for a Homestead (1877/1905/1986; set in Gorham, Maine)
  • The Unseen Hand; or, James Renfew and His Boy Helpers (1881)

Miscellaneous; or, Series Unknown

  • Norman Cline (1869)
  • A Strong Arm and a Mother's Blessing (1880)
  • The Live Oak Boys; or, The Adventures of Richard Constable Afloat and Shore (1882)

Selected Resources

  • Spartacus to the Gladiator by Wilmot B. Mitchell (1903)

Selected Links

Kennedy, Kate (1949 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Cape Elizabeth resident Kate Kennedy is the author of two books and her work has been published in The Island Journal, the annual publication of the Island Institute and in literary magazines. She has also edited the Maine Island Trail Association's annual guidebook and she is currently writing a novel set in the 1950s southwest.

Kennedy grew up in Santa Monica, California, has an undergraduate degree from Wellesley and a master's degree from University of California, Los Angeles. She has lived in Maine since 1977 and taught writing at Portland High School for 20 years. One of the Maine Arts Commission's artists, she has conducted writing workshops at Colby College, the University of New England and at other locations throughout the state.

Bibliography

  • End Over End (2001)
  • More than Petticoats: Remarkable Maine Women (2005)

Selected Links

Kennedy, Lillian (1953 - )

Genre: Poetry

Lillian Kennedy is a family law attorney and poet who was born in Maine, raised on Munjoy Hill in Portland, Maine, and lives in Auburn.

She received a B.A. in philosophy from the University of Southern Maine in 1975 and a J.D. from the University of Maine School of Law in 1978. She's an MFA student at USM's Stonecoast.

Her poetry appears regularly in Wolf Moon Journal and has been published in Animus, Cider Press Review, and The Cafe Review, among other titles. She has had work exhibited with the sculpture of Kerstin Engman at the USM Lewiston-Auburn College gallery in 2003 and included in Off the Record (2004), an anthology of poetry by lawyers.

She co-edited A Sense of Place, Collected Maine Poems (2002, with Alice Persons and Nancy Henry).

Selected Bibliography

  • Tomorrow After Night (2003)
  • Notions (2004)
  • Leavings (2005)

Selected Links

Preston, Douglas (1956 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery, Non-Fiction, Science Fiction/Fantasy

Doug Preston lives in Round Pond, Maine. He was born in Cambridge, Mass., raised in Wellesley, attended the Cambridge School of Weston, and graduated with honors from Pomona College (Claremont, CA), in 1978, with a degree in English literature. He's worked as manager of publications for the American Museum of Natural History in New York City; as writing instructor at Princeton University; as managing editor for the journal Curator; as a columnist for Natural History magazine; and as archaeology correspondent for the New Yorker.

He started writing full-time in 1986, moving to Santa Fe, New Mexico, from the east coast. In the early 2000s, he spent a lot of time in Florence, Italy, before moving back to family property in Maine.

Preston's books are both non-fiction and fiction titles, including thrillers that incorporate science and history arcana co-written with collaborator Lincoln Child.

Selected Bibliography

Non-Fiction

  • Dinosaurs in the Attic, (1986)
  • Cities of Gold: A Journey Across the American Southwest, (1992)
  • Talking to the Ground: One Family's Journey on Horseback Across the Sacred Land of the Navajo, (1995)
  • The Royal Road: El Camino Real from Mexico City to Santa Fe, (1998)
  • Ribbons of Time: The Dalquest Research Site, (2006)
  • Dolci Colline di Sangue, (2006)with crime journalist Mario Spezi
  • The Monster of Florence: A True Story (2008).

Thrillers co-written with Lincoln Child

Pendergast Series

  • Relic, (1995)
  • Mount Dragon, (1996)
  • Riptide, (1998)
  • Thunderhead, (1999)
  • The Ice Limit, (2000)
  • The Cabinet of Curiosities, (2002)
  • Still Life with Crows, (2003)
  • Brimstone, (2004)
  • Dance of Death, (2005)
  • The Book of the Dead, (2006)
  • The Wheel of Darkness, (2007)
  • Cemetery Dance, (2009)
  • Two Graves (2012)
  • White Fire
  • Blue Labyrinth
  • Crimson Shore
  • The Obsidian Chamber
  • City of Endless Night
  • Verses for the Dead
  • Crooked River

Gideon Series

  • Gideon's Sword
  • Gideon's Corpse (2012)
  • Lost Island
  • Beyond the Ice Limit
  • Pharaoh Key

Other Fiction

  • Jennie, (1994)
  • The Codex, (2003)
  • Tyrannosaur Canyon (2005)
  • Blasphemy, (2009)

Selected Links

Yglesias, Helen (1915 - 2008)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Born (March 29, 1915) and educated in New York, Helen Yglesias lived in New York City and, until several years before her death on March 28, 2008, in Brooklin, Maine. Her second husband, from whom she was divorced in 1992 after 42 years of marriage, was the writer Jose Yglesias. Her son is the novelist Rafael Yglesias. His son is Matthew Yglesias the political blogger.

Although Helen Yglesias always thought of herself as a writer, she did not start writing full time until she was 54. Prior to that, family responsibilities required her to earn money in other ways. During her five years (1965 to 1969) as the literary editor of The Nation, she became convinced she had the ability to write as well as, if not better than, many of the authors whose work she reviewed. She subsequently resigned her position and became a full-time writer.

Yglesias was an adjunct professor at Columbia University School of Arts and visiting faculty at the Iowa Writers' Workshop. She contributed to The New Yorker, Harper's, and The New York Times Book Review. Yglesias was also a frequent reviewer for Wellesley College's Women's Review of Books.

Selected Bibliography

Novels

  • How She Died(1972) dealing with cancer
  • Family Feeling (1976), a portrait of adult children of Jewish immigrants
  • Sweetsir (1981), whose protagonist is a battered wife, and which is based on the true story of a New England woman
  • The Saviors (1987), which concerns idealism as an aging radical looks back over her life
  • The Girls (1999) about four sisters in the 90's facing life and death

Non-fiction titles

  • Starting Early, Anew, Over, and Late (1978)contains a chapter titled 'Autobiographical Fragment'in which she describes her decision to become a full-time writer.
  • Isabel Bishop (1989)
  • Semblant (1996) Only 25 copies of Semblant, to which Yglesias contributed an essay on the German painter Paula Moderdohn-Becker, were produced by the Gehenna Press, Rockport, Maine.

Kenney, Susan (1941 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Susan Kenney was born in Summit, NJ, in 1941, received a BA from Northwestern University in 1963, and an MA and a PhD from Cornell in 1964 and 1968 respectively. She's taught at Colby College since 1968, becoming a full professor of English in 1986 and director of the creative writing program in 1991. She writes two kinds of books, academic mysteries featuring professor/sleuth Roz Howard, and a continuing saga of the Boyd family, laced with issues of illness and mortality.

Selected Bibliography

Roz Howard mysteries are

  • Garden of Malice (1983)
  • Graves in Academe (1985)
  • One Fell Sloop (1990).

Boyd Family novels

  • In Another Country: A Novel (1984)
  • Sailing (1987/88)

Selected Resources

  • Great Women Mystery Writers (1994; ed. Kathleen G. Klein)

Selected Links

Price, Trudy (1940 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Trudy (Gertrude) Chambers Price is a native of The County (Aroostook). She was born in Island Falls and she grew up in Caribou.

A 1962 graduate of the University of Maine, she and her husband Ron were dairy farmers from 1966 to 1989 in Knox, Maine. For two of those years, she was, to use her words, "a reluctant teacher whose reason for teaching was to help pay the bills."

Price is the manager of the Maine Coast Book Shop in Damariscotta. She is well known to many Maine readers and writers from her prior work at the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance

Selected Bibliography

  • The Cows Are Out! Two Decades on a Maine Dairy Farm (2004)
  • Thirteen is a Lucky Number (2006)

Selected Links

Kimball, Michael (1949 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Kimball, who grew up in Auburn, Mass., moved to Maine in the early 1970s and lives in Cape Neddick. He has worked as a stevedore, milk deliverer, elementary school music teacher, and rock musician before Stephen King helped him get his first novel, Firewater Pond, published in 1995.

He teaches at the summer Stonecoast Writers' Conference in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

Books

  • Firewater Pond (1985)
  • Undone (1996)
  • Mouth to Mouth (2000)
  • Green Girls (2002)

Plays

  • Best Enemies, staged in Portsmouth, NH, Oct. 2006
  • Santa Come Home, in Grand Junction, Colorado, Nov. 2006
  • The Secret to Comedy, in Portland and York, ME, summer 2007, and Portsmouth, NH in fall 2007
  • Ghosts of Ocean House, nominated for a 2007 Edgar Award for Best Play, premiered in May 2006 in Portsmouth, NH.

Selected Resources

Kimber, Robert ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Writer/environmentalist Robert Kimber lives in Temple, Maine. His essay, "No Night Life" was published in The Quotable Moose (1994). He is also one of three editors of On Wilderness: Voices from Maine (2003). His essays/articles have appeared in Field and Stream, Down East and Country Journal.

Kimber and his wife Ruth have translated numerous books from German into English. During the 1980s and 1990s they were the translators for many Barron's Educational Series pet and pet care books.

Kimber is an advocate for Maine's natural and wild lands. He is actively involved in the Western Maine Audubon Society and the Tumbledown Conservation Alliance. He is on the citizen advisory committee for The Northern Forest Lands Council and is on the national advisory committee for Americans for a Maine Woods National Park. His Nov. 2005 op-ed on the Plum Creek development planned for the Moosehead Lake region of Maine are available on the Natural Resource Council of Maine's website. Kimber was one of the recipients of the Natural Resources Council's 2003 Environmental Award.

Selected Bibliography

  • Upcountry: Reflections from a Rural Life (1991)
  • Made for the Country (1991)
  • A Canoeist's Sketchbook (1991)
  • Living Wild and Domestic: The Education of a Hunter-Gardener (2002)

Selected Links

King, Stephen (1947 - )

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction, Horror, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Stephen King (aka Richard Bachman) is the pre-eminent Maine modern popular fiction writer. The Maine master of horror was born in Portland, attended Durham Elementary School and Lisbon High, and graduated from the University of Maine in Orono with a degree in English in 1970. He married another Maine writer, Tabitha (Spruce) King, in 1971.

A prolific and highly popular author, many of his works have been adapted to film, television series, mini-series and movie. Always on the cutting edge, he has embraced the medium of the graphic novel as well as on-line publishing, creating titles which are only available online.

King was the 2003 Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. The annual award was created in to celebrate an American author who has enriched the literary landscape through a lifetime of service or body of work.

Selected Bibliography

  • Carrie (l974)
  • Salem's Lot (l975)
  • The Shining (l977)
  • The Stand (l978)
  • The Dead Zone (l979)
  • The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger (l982), first in series
  • It (1986)
  • Misery (l987)
  • The Dark Tower: The Drawing of the Three (l987), second in series
  • Tommyknockers (l987)
  • The Waste Lands (l99l), third in series
  • The Dark Tower: Wizard & Glass (1997), fourth in series
  • Bag of Bones (1998)
  • The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon (1999)
  • Hearts in Atlantis (1999)
  • The Dark Tower: Wolves of the Calla (2003), fifth in series
  • The Dark Tower: Song of Susannah (2004), sixth in series
  • The Dark Tower (Nov. 2004), seventh and final book in The Dark Tower series
  • Faithful: Two Diehard Boston Red Sox Fans Chronicle the Historic 2004 Season with Stewart O'Nan (2004)
  • The Colorado Kid (2005)
  • Cell: A Novel (2006)
  • Lisey's Story (2006)
  • Duma Key (2008)
  • Under the Dome (2009)
  • Danse Macabre (2010)
  • Blockade Billy (2010)
  • The Wind Through the Keyhole (2012)
  • Joyland (2013)
  • Mr. Mercedes (2014) Edgar Award Winner
  • Revival: A Novel (2014)
  • Bazaar of Bad Dreams: Stories (2015)
  • Finder's Keeper's (2015)
  • The Gunslinger (2016)
  • End of Watch: A Novel (2016)
  • Gwendy's Button Box (2017) with Richard Chizmar
  • Sleeping Beauties: A Novel (2017)
  • Elevation (2018)
  • The Outsider: A Novel (2018)
  • The Institute: A Novel (2019)
  • If It Bleeds: New Fiction (2020)

As Richard Bachman

  • Rage (l977)
  • The Long Walk (l979)
  • Roadwork (l98l)
  • The Running Man (l982)
  • Thinner (l984)
  • The Regulators (l996)
  • Blaze (2007)

Selected Resources

  • The Essential Stephen King: The Greatest Novels Short Stories, Movies, and Other Creations of the World's Most Popular Writer, edited by Stephen J. Pignesi,(2001) - Stephen King's The Dark Tower: A Concordance, Vol. 1 by Robin Furth (2003)
  • Feast of Fear: Conversations with Stephen King edited by Tim Underwood and Chuck Miller (1989)
  • Stephen King from A to Z by George Beahm(1998)
  • Reading Stephen King (1997) by Brenda Miller Power et al
  • The Lost Work of Stephen King by Stephen Spignesi (1998)
  • The Stephen King Universe: A Guide to the Worlds of the King of Horror (2001) by Stanley Wiater, Christopher Golden, and Hank Wagner

Selected Links

Landry, Deborah (1954 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Deborah Landry, who was born and raised in Dexter and lives in Saco, is a youth advocate who writes books and interactive plays for children on issues of social awareness.

She is founder and executive director of Crossroads Youth Center in Saco, a non-profit organization "promoting self esteem, self respect and awareness through the performing arts," and in that capacity serves on the statewide committee Communities for Children & Youth. As a member of the Maine Legislature's Best Practice Guide Design Team for LD #564, she helped create anti-bullying legislation, which became law in July 2005, and which defines bullying and requires training in bullying prevention for educators and others who work with children. Her community work has been recognized with awards from the United Way and Rotary International.

Previously, she worked for more than two decades as a healthcare administrator. There's more about Landry at Bryson Taylor Publishing and on Thornton Academy's website.

Selected Bibliography

Children's Books

  • Sticks, Stones & Stumped! (2006) illus. by Melissa Pelletier
  • Yankee Go Home (2007)

Plays

  • For Pete's Sake (2006), based on a book written by Linda Verville,

Selected Links

Knickerbocker, Charles (1922 - 2001)

Genre: General Fiction

Dr. Charles Knickerbocker was born in Syracuse, NY in 1922. His mother (SEE Frances W. (Cutler) Knickerbocker) was a native of Bangor and the family summered in Southwest Harbor. He received his B.S. from the University of the South and his M.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Medical School in 1946. He settled in Bar Harbor, ME, in 1947.

An internist, Knickerbocker was president of the Hancock County Medical Society and chief of medicine at the Mt. Desert Island Hospital. Besides practicing medicine, he also has written novels and many magazine articles and stories, often published anonymously or under a pseudonym.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Boy Came Back (1951)
  • Juniper Island (1958)
  • The Dynasty (1962)
  • Summer Doctor (1963)
  • The Hospital War (1966)
  • Hide and Seek: The Effect of Mind, Body, and Emotion on Personality and Behavior in Ourselves and Others (1967)
  • Fool's Gold (1992)

Editor

  • Minister's Daughter: A Time Exposure Photograph of the Years 1903-04, by Francis Wentworth Cutler (1974)
  • Of Battles Long Ago: Memoirs of an Ambulance Driver in World War I, by G. Ripley Cutler (1979)

Selected Resources

Knight, Margy ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Margy Burns Knight, born and raised in Pennsylvania, moved to Maine in 1972 to attend Bowdoin College. She and her family live in Winthrop and she is an ESL teacher in Augusta schools. Knight has also lived and worked in England and Switzerland, and in Benin (Africa) as a Peace Corp volunteer.

Knight's books concern multiculturalism. Her Talking Walls books use walls in various cultures around the world, such as the Berlin Wall and the Great Wall of China, as jumping-off points for discussing the other cultures. All Knight's books are illustrated by Peak's Islander Anne Sibley O'Brien.

Selected Bibliography

  • Talking Walls (1992)
  • Who Belongs Here?: An American Story (1993)
  • Welcoming Babies (1994)
  • Talking Walls: The Stories Continue (1996)
  • Africa is Not a Country (with Mark Melnicove, 2000)

Selected Links

Lanz, Amy ( - )

Genre: Romance Novel

Romance novelist Amy Lanz, who writes as Amy Frazier, was born in coastal Maine, descended from Nova Scotia Acadians, and now lives in northwest Georgia with her family.

She sold her first Silhouette Special Edition series novel in 1994.

Besides writing, Lanz has also had careers as a teacher, librarian, professional storyteller, and free-lance artist.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Secret Baby (1995/2001 - Babies and Bachelors series)
  • New Bride in Town (1996; Sweet Hope Weddings series)
  • Waiting at the Altar (1996; Sweet Hope Weddings series)
  • A Good Groom is Hard to Find (1996, Sweet Hope Weddings series)
  • Baby Starts the Wedding March (1998)
  • Celebrate the Child (1999)
  • Family by the Bunch (1999)
  • A Bundle of Miracles (2000)
  • Independence Day (2005; Harlequin Superromance No. 1298)
  • The Trick to Getting a Mom: Single Father (2005; Harlequin Superromance No. 1269)
  • Babies on the Doorstep (2006; with Janis Reams Hudson)
  • Just My Luck (2000; Silhouette's Kensington Precious Gems series) as Amy Lanz

Lawless, Gary (1951 - )

Genre: Poetry

Gary Lawless is a poet, bookstore owner, book editor, and publisher, born in Belfast and living now in Nobleboro. He is co-owner of Gulf of Maine Books in Brunswick (with Beth Leonard) and owner of the publishing company Blackberry Books in Nobleboro.

He is an associate professor of literature at Bates College in Lewiston, where he teaches courses in creative writing and environmental literature. Lawless has been poet-in-residence for the town of Sitka, Alaska, and for the National Park Service at Isle Royale National Park at Lake Superior, in 1998, and he taught creative writing for five years in MSAD 75's adult education program.

After graduating from Colby College in 1973, Lawless left Maine to spend a year in California studying with poet Gary Snyder. When Lawless returned to Maine, he brought the idea of the budding bioregional movement with him. In 1987, he organised a Gulf of Maine Bioregional Congress, bringing together a diverse group of back-to-the-land and "green" folks from across northern New England and eastern Canada for a four-day series of workshops and presentations.

Lawless has written and edited several books, all with the common theme of ecological integrity and spirit.

Selected Bibliography

  • Songs of the Dream Caribou (date unknown)
  • Full Flower Moon (1975)
  • Wintering (1975)
  • Two Owls (1976)
  • Gulf of Maine: A Blackberry Reader (1977)
  • Dark Moon/White Pine (1978)
  • Salted in the Shell 23 (1978)
  • Wolf Driving Sled: Selected Poems, 1970-1980 (1981)
  • Ice Tatoo (1982) with Stephen Petrof
  • Yellow Dog (1986)
  • First Sight of Land (1990)
  • Sitka Spring (1991)
  • The Indian Shell Heap: Archaeology of the Ruth Moore Site (1994)
  • Poems for the Wild Earth (1994)
  • Somewhere Within the Shell Mound (1995)
  • Caribouddhism: Sutras and the Holy Lands (1998)
  • Nanao or Never: Nanao Sakaki Walks Earth A (2000)
  • In Ruins (2002)

MacDonald, Amy (1951 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Amy MacDonald was born and grew up in Beverly, Mass. and vacationed on Mt. Desert Island as a child. She graduated from the Univ. of Pennsylvania in 1973. Since 1988 she has lived in Falmouth, Maine with her husband, and sons. Besides being a writer of children's books, MacDonald has also been an editor, a journalist, a consultant in the U.S., France, and Great Britain, and a theatre company publications director. In addition to the books below, MacDonald has written a children's musical, Stop That Noise! She regularly teaches writing classes to kids in K-6 grades and has served as co-president of the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance board of trustees.

Selected Bibliography

Books for Children

  • Little Beaver and the Echo, (1990/1997/1998/1999)
  • Rachel Fister's Blister, (1990/1993/1996/1999)
  • Let's Play, (1992)
  • Let's Try, (1992)
  • Let's Make a Noise, (1992)
  • Let's Do It, (1992)
  • Let's Go, (1993)
  • Let's Pretend, (1993)
  • Cousin Ruth's Toothm (1996)
  • The Spider Who Created the World, (1996)
  • No More Nice, (1996/1998/1999)
  • No More Nasty, (2001)
  • Please, Malese: A Trickster Tale from Haiti, (2001)
  • Quentin Fenton Herter III, (2002)

Books for Adults

  • The Very Young Housewife, (1979)
  • The Presumpscot River Watch Guide to the Presumpscot River: Its History, Ecology, and Recreational Uses, (1994).

Related Links

Amy MacDonald's website

Lawson, Dorie (1968 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Dorie McCullough Lawson grew up in West Tisbury (Martha's Vineyard), MA, attended Sidwell Friends high school in Washington, DC ('86), and lived for seven years in Sheridan, WY. She lives in Rockport, ME with her family.

She has a history degree from Middlebury College. Her father is the well-known historian and writer David McCullough.

Lawson is founder and owner of Soldier's Creek Associates, a lecture agency representing writers, including her dad.

Bibliography

  • Posterity: Letters of Great Americans to Their Children (2004)
  • Along Comes a Stranger (2007)

MacInerney, Karen (1970 - )

Genre: Mystery

Karen MacInerney is a writer of mysteries who resides in Austin, Texas. Her mystery series is set on an island similar to Little Cranberry Island, which she's visited, and she vacations in Maine annually.

She spent summers as a child on Pool's Island, off the coast of Newfoundland.

Previous jobs have included public relations writer and advertising account executive.

Selected Bibliography

  • Murder on the Rocks, (2006)
  • Dead and Berried, (2007)
  • Murder most Maine: a Gray Whale Inn mystery (2008)
  • Howling at the moon: tales of an urban werewolf (2008)

Related Websites

MacLeod, Charlotte (1922 - 2005)

Genre: Mystery

McLeod (aka Alisa Craig, her Canadian nom de plume), was born in Bath, New Brunswick but lived for years in rural Maine. Her many mysteries are imbued with a sense of humor, including the 12 featuring sleuth Sarah Kelling and the 10 that feature agronomist Professor Peter Shandy and his librarian wife, Helen.

MacLeod was co-founder of American Crime Writers League. She was nominated in 1988 for an Edgar Award and Malice Domestic honored her in 1998 with a lifetime achievement award.

Selected Bibliography

Peter Shandy Series (in order):

  • Rest You Merry, (1978)
  • The Luck Runs Out, (1979)
  • Wrack and Rune, (1982)
  • Something the Cat Dragged In, (1983)
  • The Curse of the Giant Hogweed, (1985)
  • The Corpse in Oozak's Pond, (1987) (Edgar Award nominee)
  • Vane Pursuit, (1989)
  • An Owl Too Many, (1991)
  • Something in the Water, (1994)
  • Exit the Milkman, (1996)

Sarah Kelling Series (in order)

  • The Family Vault, (1979)
  • The Withdrawing Room, (1980)
  • The Palace Guard, (1981)
  • The Bilbao Looking Glass, (1983)
  • The Convivial Codfish, (1984)
  • The Plain Old Man, (1985)
  • The Recycled Citizen, (1988)
  • The Silver Ghost, (1988)
  • The Gladstone Bag, (1989)
  • The Resurrection Man, (1992)
  • The Odd Job, (1995)
  • The Balloon Man, (1998/2000)

Short Story Collections

  • Grab Bag
  • Christmas Stalkings: Tales of Yuletide Murder, (1994)
  • It Was an Awful Shame and Other Stories (2002)

Alisa Craig's Madoc & Janet Rhys series:

  • A Pint of Murder, (1980)
  • Murder Goes Mumming, (1981)
  • The Terrible Tide, (1983)
  • A Dismal Thing to Do, (1986/1988)
  • Trouble in the Brasses, (1989/1991)
  • The Wrong Rite, (1992)

Non-Series Books:

  • Ask Me No Questions, (1971)
  • King Devil, (1978)
  • Cirak's Daughter (1982)

Non-Fiction:

  • Had She But Known: A Biography of Mary Roberts Rinehart, (1994)

Related Links:

Lee, Sharon (1952 - )

Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy, Short Stories

Biography

Sharon Lee was born in Baltimore, attended Univ. of Maryland, Baltimore County, and rose to the pinnacle of her professional career as administrative aide to the Dean of the School of Social Work at Univ. of Maryland's Baltimore City campus. She quit that job to open a bookstore, Book Castle, in 1978 and when that failed, went on to deliver tractor trailers, sell cider at the farmer's market, and work as an advertising copywriter. Lee and her husband Steve Miller are the co-authors of the Liaden Universe books, a romantic space opera.

Selected Bibliography

Liaden Universe

  • Agent of Change, (1988)
  • Conflict of Honors, (1988)
  • Carpe Diem, (1989)
  • Plan B
  • Local Custom
  • Scout's Progress
  • I Dare, (2002)
  • Crystal Soldier, 2005
  • Crystal Dragon , (2006)
  • Balance of Trade (2004) Won the Hal Clement Award for Best Young Adult Science Fiction Novel of 2004
  • Ghost Ship (2012)
  • Dragon Ship (2012)

Gem ser Edreth Adventures Series

  • The Tomorrow Log, (2003)

Short Stories

  • "Candlelight" (co-written with Miller) in 1995
  • "The Big Ice,", (1999)
  • "Passionato", (1999), a vampire story

Selected Websites

Tagliabue, John (1923 - 2006)

Genre: Poetry

Born in Cantu, Italy, on July 1, 1923, poet John Tagliabue moved to New Jersey when he was a child. He earned both a B.A. and M.A. from Columbia University. After graduation he was the recipient of seven Fulbright Grants, which enabled him to travel, study and teach in Italy, Japan, China, and Indonesia. He has also taught in Spain and Brazil. In 1953 he and his family returned to the United States when he accepted a teaching position at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine. He taught there until his retirement in 1989. Tagliabue died on May 31, 2006 in Providence, Rhode Island where he had lived since 1998. Tagliabue's poetry can also be found in anthologies such as Hierbas, Purpura y Magnolias (1973); For Neruda, For Chile: An International Anthology (1975); and Poetspeak: In Their Work, About Their Work: A Selection (1983). In addition they appear in a Boston University art exhibit catalog, Marianna Pineda, Sculpture, 1949 to 1996. Tagliabue apparently also wrote (unpublished) plays in the 1950s while living in Florence, Italy.

Selected Bibliography

  • Poems (1959)
  • A Japanese Journal: Poems (1966, 1969)
  • The Buddha Uproar: Poems (1967, 1970)
  • The Doorless Door (Japan Poems) (1970)
  • The Great Day: Poems, 1962-1983 (1984)
  • New and Selected Poems: 1942-1997 (1997).

Selected Resources

Maisel, L. Sandy (1945 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Louis Sandy Maisel is the William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of Government at Colby College, Waterville. An Oakland resident, Maisel joined the Colby College Department of Government faculty in 1971. He is a 1967 Harvard graduate and received his Ph.D. from Columbia University in 1971. His fellowships include ones from Graduate Faculties of Columbia University, United States Steel, National Science Foundation and a Woodrow Wilson dissertation fellowship.

In addition to teaching at Colby, he has also been a fellow at the University of London, Institute for United States Studies, a guest scholar at the Brookings Institution, a visiting professor at both Stanford and Harvard Universities, Philippine Centennial Distinguished Fulbright Lecturer, and a visiting lecturer at the University of Melbourne and Monash University, Melbourne, Australia.

Maisel has published numerous articles in academic journals. He is a member of the editorial board for American Review of Politics and he has been an active participant in professional associations such as the American Political Science Association and the New England Political Science Association.

In 2003 Maisel was appointed the first director of Colby College's Goldfarb Center for Public Affairs and Civic Engagement.

Selected Bibliography

  • American Political Parties and Elections: A Very Short Introduction, (2008)
  • Running on Empty?: Political Discourse in Congressional Elections, (2004)
  • Parties and Elections in America: The Electoral Process, (1987)
  • Jews in American Politics, (2001)
  • Two Parties -- Or More? The American Party System, (1998)
  • The Parties Respond: Changes in the American Party System, (1990)
  • Parties and Politics in the American Past, (1994)
  • Rethinking Political Reform: Beyond Spending and Term Limits, (1994)
  • Encyclopedia of American Political Parties and Elections, (1991)
  • From Obscurity to Oblivion: Running in the Congressional Primary, (1982)
  • Congressional Elections, (1981)
  • Political Parties: Development and Decay, (1978)
  • The Impact of the Electoral Process, (1977)
  • Changing Campaign Techniques: Elections and Values in Contemporary Democracies, (1976)
  • The Future of Political Parties, (1975)

Selected Links

Levin, Betty (1927 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Levin was born in New York City and grew up in Bridgewater, Conn., NYC, and Washington DC. She lives now on a farm in Lincoln, Mass., summered in Castine, Maine for over 20 years and now in Brooksville Maine for over 16 years. In her spare time she trains sheep dogs and competes with them at the Common Ground Fair.

Levin has been a critic and a children's literature teacher as well as a children's novelist.

Selected Bibliograpy

  • The Zoo Conspiracy, (1973)
  • The Sword of Culann, (1973)
  • A Griffin's Nest, (1975)
  • The Forespoken, (1976)
  • Landfall, (1979)
  • Beast on the Brink, (1980)
  • The Keeping-Room, (1981)
  • A Binding Spell, (1984)
  • Put On My Crown, (1985)
  • The Ice Bear, (1986)
  • The Trouble with Gramary, (1988)
  • Brother Moose, (1990)
  • Mercy's Mill, (1992)
  • Starshine and Sunglow, (1994)
  • Away to Me, Moss!, (1994)
  • Fire in the Wind, (1995/1999)
  • Gift Horse, (1996)
  • Island Bound, (1997/2000)
  • Look Back, Moss, (1998)
  • The Banished, (1999)
  • Creature Crossing, (1999)
  • Shadow-Catcher, (2000)
  • That'll Do, Moss, (2002)
  • Shoddy Cove, (2003)
  • Thorn, (2005)

Mallat, Kathy (1955 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Kathy Mallat was raised in Sunapee, New Hampshire, and lives in West Lebanon, Maine.

She earned her Bachelor of Science degree in art education at Plymouth State College. In addition to writing books, she also teaches art at Lebanon Elementary School and is available to speak to school classes.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Picture That Mom Drew, (1997)
  • Seven Stars More!, (1998)
  • Brave Bear, 1999 (winner of the Parenting Magazine Reading Magic Award, (1999)
  • Trouble on the Tracks, (2001)
  • Just Ducky, (2002)
  • Oh Brother/Oh Brother, (2003)
  • Papa Pride, (2005)

Selected Links

Kathy Mallat's Website

Lewis, Robert (1802 - 1859)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Robert Benjamin Lewis lived in Hallowell and Bath ME and was Maine's pioneering African-American writer, as well as the inventor of the patented oakum picking machine. Lewis's book, Light and Truth, From Ancient and Sacred History is considered the first Afro-centric history published in the U.S (first printing, 1836). It consists in part of short sketches of prominent African-American leaders. Lewis believed blacks would never have equality in the U.S. and he became involved in colonization efforts in Haiti, where he died before the Civil War.

Selected Bibliography

  • Light and Truth: Collected from the Bible and Ancient and Modern History Containing the Universal History of the Colored and Indian Race from the Creation of the World to the Present Time, 1844.

Related Websites

Manning, Jackie ( - )

Genre: Romance Novel

Jackie Manning (pseud. Jackie Summers) is a best-selling historical romance author who lives in Waterville. Besides publishing romances, she also speaks at writers' conferences and has taught adult education courses. Before her writing career, she ran a tax accounting agency.

Selected Bibliography

  • Embrace the Dawn, (1995) (as Jackie Summers)
  • A Wish For Nicholas, (1997/1998)
  • Silver Hearts, (1999)
  • Heaven on Earth, (2000)

Little, Carl (1954 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Art critic, freelance writer, and poet Carl Little, who lives in Somesville, Mount Desert Island, was born in New York City. He received his B.A. from Dartmouth College, his M.F.A. from Columbia University, and a master's from Middlebury College. He is Director of Communications and Marketing for the Maine Community Foundation.

Previously, Little was director of public affairs and director of the Ethel H. Blum Gallery at College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, and before that was an editor at Windswept House Publishers, owned by writer/publisher Jane Weinberger. He is a former associate editor for Art in America magazine, to which he contributes regularly, and he has written many articles for Art New England, Maine Boats, Homes and Harbors, Ornament, and was a regular contributor to the Bangor Daily News and the Maine Times. Much of his freelance work focuses on his knowledge of Maine art, an interest he acquired from his uncle, William Kienbusch, the painter who was a founder of Maine Coast Artists and lived on Great Cranberry Island.

Little and artist/book designer Arnold Skolnick have collaborated on several art books, Little writing the text and Skolnick creating the book's design.

Selected Art/Criticism Works

  • Bernard Langlais: Works on Paper, (1990)
  • Paintings of Maine,(1991/1996)
  • Edward Hopper's New England, (1993)
  • Winslow Homer and the Sea, (1995)
  • Paintings of New England, (1996)
  • William Kienbusch: A Retrospective Exhibition, 1946-1979, (1996)
  • Art of the Maine Islands, (1997)
  • Winslow Homer: His Art, His Light, His Landscapes, (1997)
  • The Watercolors of John Singer Sargent,(1998)
  • Beverly Hallam: Odyssey in Art, (1998)
  • The Art of Maine in Winter, (2002)
  • Discovery: 50 Years of Craft Experience at Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, (2004)
  • Painting Maine: The Borrowed Views of Connie Hayes, (2004)
  • Lawrence S. Goldsmith: A Life in Watercolor, (2004)
  • The Art of Monhegan, (2004)
  • Phyllis Rees: Intimate Views of Nature, (2006)
  • Paintings of Maine: A New Collection, (2006)

Books of Poetry

  • 3,000 Dreams Explained, (Nightshade Press, 1992).
  • Ocean Drinker: New & Selected Poems, (Deerbrook Editions, 2006).

Related Links

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth (1807 - 1882)

Genre: Poetry

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow is possibly America's best-loved poet. He was born in Portland, attended Bowdoin College (1822-1825) and became the first professor of modern languages there from 1829-1835. He went on to teach at Harvard from 1836-1854.

His family home, the Wadsworth-Longfellow House in Portland ME, is a museum run by the Maine Historical Society and is open to the public.

Selected Bibliography

Books by Longfellow

  • Outre-Mer: A Pilgrimage Beyond the Sea, (1833)
  • Voices of the Night, (1839)
  • Ballads and Other Poems, (1842)
  • Evangeline, (1847)
  • The Song of Hiawatha, (1855)
  • The Courtship of Miles Standish, (1858)
  • Paul Revere's Ride, (1860)
  • The Children's Hour, (1860)
  • The Belfry of Bruges and Other Poems
  • The Seaside and the Fireside
  • Tales of a Wayside Inn, (1863/1872/1873)

Selected Resources

Books about Longfellow

  • Longfellow: A Rediscovered Life, by Charles C. Calhoun. (Beacon Press, 2004).

Selected Resources

Selected Links

Rankin, Laura (1953 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Laura Rankin, a children's book writer and illustrator living in Kennebunk, grew up in Western New York.

She received her B.A. in speech and drama from the University of New Hampshire in 1975, worked as a courtroom illustrator for a TV station in Buffalo, New York, then spent 15 years as an editorial artist for The Buffalo News (1977-1992).

She received an honorary doctorate from the University at Buffalo, State University of New York in 1996.

Selected Bibliography

Author

  • The Handmade Alphabet (1991) (ALA Notable Children's Book and a Boston Globe-Horn Book Non-Fiction Honor Book)
  • Merl and Jasper's Supper Caper (1997)
  • The Handmade Counting Book (1998)
  • Swan Harbor: A Nature Counting Book (2003)
  • Ruthie and the (Not So) Teeny Tiny Lie (2007)

Illustrator

  • Fabulous Fish from Lake Wiggawalla by Teddy Slater (1991)
  • Why Buster Beasley Was Late for Lunch by Teddy Slater (1991)
  • The Wriggly, Wriggly Baby by Jessica Clerk (2002)
  • Rabbit Ears by Amber Stewart (2007)

Lovejoy, Sharon (1945 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator, Non-Fiction

Sharon Lovejoy -- who writes and illustrates gardening articles and gardening books for children -- divides her time between residences in Cambria, California, and South Bristol, Maine; Country Living magazine published a short piece on Lovejoy's 1930s campground cottage in South Bristol.

Fond of both botany and illustration, Lovejoy graduated with distinction in the field of art from San Diego State University. She has worked as a naturalist for the Morro Bay Museum of Natural History and for the Smithsonian Institute in Baja, California, and she frequently lectures about gardening at conferences, symposia, museums, botanical gardens and arboreta, educational institutions, and for professional trade associations and gardening organizations.

She writes and illustrates a gardening column for Country Living Gardener magazine and is a regular columnist for AAA's Northern New England Journey magazine. Her articles have also appeared in Family Life, Country America, The American Horticulturist, The Herb Companion, Ranger Rick, and People, Places and Plants, among others.

In 1999, she received the Quill and Trowel Award from Garden Writers Association of America (GWAA) for her magazine writing.

Selected Bibliography

Children's Books

  • Roots, Shoots, Buckets & Boots: Gardening Together with Children, (1999)
  • Hollyhock Days: Garden Adventures for the Young at Heart, (1994);
  • Sunflower Houses: Sharing Secrets from Gardens Past: A Book for Parents and Children, (2001)
  • The Little Green Island with a Little Red House: A Book of Colors and Critters, (2005) (Winner of the 2005 National Outdoor Book Award, Children's book Category

Books for Adults

  • Trowel & Error (2003),
  • A Blessing of Toads: A Gardener's Guide to Living with Nature (2004),

Related Links

Hetley, James (1947 - )

Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy

James Hetley is an architect and fantasy author who ives in Bangor.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Summer Country (2002)
  • The Winter Oak (2004), set in fictional Naskeag Falls, Maine ('an amalgam of Bangor and Lewiston/Auburn, with University of Maine at Orono tacked on')
  • Dragon's Eye (2005) and
  • Dragon's Teeth (2006) featuring families of fictional hardscrabble Stonefort, Maine ('a small coastal community modeled on Stonington or Jonesport')

Tarkington, Booth (1869 - 1946)

Genre: General Fiction

Booth Tarkington, prolific novelist and playwright, wrote "cheerful, realistic novels about life in the Middle West," including two Pulitzer Prize winners.

Born in Indianapolis on 29 July 1869, Tarkington traveled throughout Europe and North America, and eventually built an estate called Seawood in Kennebunkport, Maine where he and his second wife, Susannah Robinson, lived from May through December each year, returning to Indianapolis for the balance.

Tarkington had a middle-class upbringing in Indianapolis. He attended Purdue University and then Princeton University (class of 1893), graduating from neither. He was editor of the Nassau Literary Magazine at Princeton, which later awarded him both an honorary A.M. (1899) and an honorary Litt.D. (1918).

In 1893, Tarkington returned to Indianapolis and tried to make a living from drawing and writing. A period of rejections followed his sale of a sketch with text to Life magazine in 1895, but finally, in 1898, Tarkington's manuscript The Gentleman from Indiana was accepted for publication by New York publisher S.S. McClure and became a bestseller in 1900, launching a long and financially successful literary career.

The 1921 Publishers Weekly poll of booksellers rated him the most significant contemporary American author, above Sinclair Lewis, Robert Frost and Carl Sandburg. His short story, 'Cider of Normandy,'won the 1931 O. Henry Memorial Award.

Tarkington died on 19 May 1946.

Selected Bibliography

  • Gentleman from Indiana (1899)
  • Monsieur Beaucaire (1900)
  • Two Vanrevels (1902)
  • Cherry (1903)
  • The Conquest of Canaan (1905)
  • In the Arena: Stories of Political Life (1905)
  • The Beautiful Lady (1905)
  • His Own People (1907)
  • The Man From Home, a Play in Four Acts (1908)
  • Guest of Quesnay (1908)
  • Beasley's Christmas Party (1909)
  • The Flirt (1912 )
  • Beauty and the Jacobin; An Interlude of the French Revolution (1912)
  • Penrod (1914)
  • The Turmoil: A Novel (1915 )
  • Seventeen: A Tale of Youth and Summer Time and the Baxter Family, Especially William (1915)
  • Penrod and Sam (1916)
  • The Ohio Lady (1916)
  • Harlequin and Columbine, and other stories... (1918)
  • The Magnificent Ambersons (1918) Pulitzer Prize Winner
  • Gentle Julia (1918)
  • Ramsey Milholland (1919)
  • The Gibson Upright (1919)
  • Clarence; a Comedy in Four Acts (1921)
  • The Country Cousin; a Comedy in Four Acts (1921)
  • Alice Adams (1922) Pulitzer Prize winner
  • Ghost Story; a One-Act Play for Persons of No Great Age (1922)
  • The Wren; A Comedy in Three Acts (1922)
  • Works [Seawood Edition] (1922)
  • The Collector's Whatnot (1923)
  • Midlander (1923)
  • The Fascinating Stranger, and other stories (1923)
  • Trysting Place; A Farce in One Act (1923)
  • Tweedles, A Comedy (1924)
  • Cherry, and Beasley's Christmas Party (1925)
  • Women (1925)
  • Bimbo, the Pirate (1926)
  • Looking Forward, and others (1926)
  • Growth (1927)
  • The Plutocrat, a Novel (1927)
  • Station YYYY (1927)
  • The Travelers: A One-Act Play (1927)
  • The World Does Move (1928)
  • Claire Ambler (1928)
  • Young Mrs. Greeley (1929)
  • Penrod Jashber (1929)
  • How's Your Health? A Comedy in Three Acts (1930)
  • Mirthful Haven (1930)
  • Penrod, His Complete Story (1931)
  • The Works of Booth Tarkington (1902-1932)
  • Mary's Neck (1932)
  • Wanton Mally: A Romance of England in the Days of Charles II (1932)
  • Presenting Lily Mars (1933)
  • Help Each Other Club (1934)
  • Little Orvie (1934)
  • Mister Antonio; a Play in Four Acts (1935)
  • Mr. White. The Red barn. Hell, and Bridewater (1935)
  • Lorenzo Bunch (1936)
  • Rumbin Galleries (1937)
  • Some Old Portraits: A Book About Art and Human Beings (1939)
  • The Heritage of Hatcher Ide (1941)
  • The Fighting Littles (1941)
  • Kate Fennigate (1943)
  • The Gentleman from Indianapolis: A Treasury of Booth Tarkington (1944)
  • Lady Hamilton and Her Nelson (1945)
  • Image of Josephine (1945)
  • The Show Piece (1947; his last novel)
  • Your Amiable Uncle; Letters to His Nephews by Booth Tarkington (1949: illus. with his original sketches)
  • Dr. [Erwin] Panofsky and Booth Tarkington, An Exchange of Letters 1938-1946 (1974)

Selected Resources

Taylor, Alan (1955 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Historian Alan Taylor, born June 17, 1955, grew up in Windham, Maine and graduated from Colby College in 1977. He received his Ph.D. from Brandeis University in 1986. Among his fellowships are the National Endowment for the Humanities Postdoctoral Fellow at the Institute of Early American History and Culture at The College of William and Mary, plus fellowships from the American Antiquarian Society, the National Humanities Center, and the Huntington Library. Taylor has been a history professor at the University of California at Davis since 1994. Of special note is the annual UC Davis Prize for Undergraduate Teaching and Scholarly Achievement that was awarded to Taylor in 2002. The $30,000 prize is said to be the largest award of its type in the United States. At the award ceremony Taylor announced he was giving $20,000 of the prize money to the Roland Marchand Memorial Fund, named in memory of Marchand who taught 33 years at UC Davis, which provides support to graduate students in American history at UC Davis.

Selected Bibliogropahy

  • William Cooper's Town: Power and Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early American Republic (1995),received Pulitzer, Bancroft, and Beveridge prizes; which explores the lives of Judge William Cooper and the novelist James Fenimore Cooper, who were father and son.
  • Liberty Men and Great Proprietors: The Revolutionary Settlement on the Maine Frontier, 1760-1820 1990 included in the Mirror of Maine.
  • American Colonies, (2001) the first of five volumes in The Penguin History of the United States. The book received the gold medal for nonfiction in the 71st California Book Awards.
  • The Civil War of 1812 : American Citizens, British Subjects, Irish Rebels, & Indian Allies, 2010.

Selected Resources

Taylor, Henry (1942 - )

Genre: Poetry

Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Henry S. Taylor was born on June 21, 1942 in rural Loudon County, Virginia, received his B.A. in English from the University of Virginia in 1965 and his Masters in creative writing from Hollins College in 1966.

He used to divide his time between Brunswick, Maine and northern Virginia where he was co-director of the creative writing program at American University until 2003. Before coming to American University, he taught at Roanoke College in Salem, Virginia and the University of Utah.

Taylor has also published a poetry textbook, a book of essays, and a translation of Euripides' Children of Herakles. He translates poetry from Bulgarian, French, Hebrew, Italian and Russian.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Flying Change (1986) Pulitzer Prize
  • The Horse Show at Midnight (1966)
  • An Afternoon of Pocket Billiards (1975
  • Understanding Fiction: Poems 1986-1996 (1997)
  • Brief Candles: 101 Clerihews (1999)
  • Crooked Run (2006)

Taylor, Robert (1940 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

Robert Taylor, born in Abilene, Texas, on 22 July 1940, lived in Blue Hill, Maine from 1986 to 2003. In 2003, he moved to Oberlin, OH where he is an Affiliate Scholar at Oberlin College.

He graduated with honors from Texas Technological College (now Texas Tech Univ.) in 1962 with a degree in journalism. While in college, he was a ROTC member, and on graduation was commissioned as an Army second lieutenant, assigned to the Pentagon from 1963-1966 and served in Vietnam at Army Headquarters in 1967, receiving a Bronze Star that same year. He was released from active duty when he returned stateside and lived in Washington, D.C. for a while.

He has been the editor of Transportation U.S.A., assistant editor of Music Educators Journal, and deputy editor of America Illustrated, a now-defunct Russian-language magazine distributed in Russia.

Taylor reads from his works at libraries and bookstores around the country and speaks on issues of peace. He is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Pierre Monteux Memorial Foundation in Hancock, Maine which sponsors a six-week school for conductors and orchestra musicians each summer.

Selected Bibliography

Novels

  • The Innocent (1997)
  • All We Have Is Now (2002)
  • Whose Eye Is On Which Sparrow? (2004)
  • A Few Hints and Clews (2007)

Short Stories

  • Revelation and Other Stories (2002)

Selected Links

Testa, Maria (1964 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Poetry, Young Adult

Maria Testa is a Rhode Island native (born 4 April 1964), who lives in Portland, Maine. She also lived in Dublin, Ireland, for a bit.

She studied sociology at Brown University and specialized in family law at Yale University Law School, graduating in 1989.

Her target audience usually is pre-teen boys; her books usually have male protagonists and explore gritty issues like homelessness and parents in prison. In 2002, she started a trilogy of books that explore her father's life.

Selected Bibliography

  • 'Thumbs Up, Rico!' (1994)
  • Dancing Pink Flamingos and Other Stories (1995)
  • Nine Candles (1996)
  • Someplace to Go (1996)
  • Some Kind of Pride (2001)
  • Becoming Joe DiMaggio (2002) Lupine Award
  • Almost Forever (2003)
  • Something About America (2005)

Selected Links

Thayer, Cynthia (1944 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Cynthia Thayer and her family run an organic farm called Darthia Farm in Gouldsboro, Maine.

She was born in New York City on 11 March 1944 and raised in Nova Scotia. She is a spinner and a weaver as well as a writer.

Thayer received her B.A. in British Literature from Bridgewater State College (MA), graduating Magna cum Laude, and has taught English and theater in public high schools in Massachusetts, and adult education and writing workshops in Maine.

Winner, 2013 Maine Literary Awards for Short Works Competition: Fiction.

Selected Bibliography

  • Strong for Potatoes (1998)
  • A Certain Slant of Light (2000)
  • A Brief Lunacy (2005)

Selected Resources

  • Vertical File Maine State Library

Thorndike, Virginia (1945 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Virginia (Dinnie) Thorndike (born 6 Oct. 1945) lived in Morrill, Maine; she lives in Huntington Beach, CA.

She has a B.A. from Boston University (1967).

Many of her books deal with sailing and boats. She comes from a family of sailors -- her great-grandfather was a three-time America's Cup defender and her grandfather designed sailing yachts and was also an America's Cup contender.

Bibliography

  • The Arctic Schooner Bowdoin: A Biography (1995)
  • Windjammer Watching on the Coast of Maine: A Guide to the Famous Windjammer Fleet and 34 Other Traditional Sailing Vessels (1993)
  • How We Got There From Here: Remembering the Days of Steamers, Trolleys, and Model Ts in Maine (1997)
  • Maine Lobsterboats: Builders and Lobstermen Speak of Their Craft (1998)
  • On Tugboats: Stories of Work and Life Aboard (2004)
  • Islanders: Real Life on the Maine Islands (2005)
  • LNG: A Level-Headed Look at the Liquefied Natural Gas Controversy (2007)

Holmes, Edward (1910 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Short Stories

Ted Holmes (September 27, 1910) was born in Montclair, New Jersey and has been a Maine resident since 1939. His received his undergraduate degree from Dartmouth College and his doctorate in from Brown University. He is professor emeritus of the University of Maine where he taught English until the age of 85. Holmes' novel and short stories are set in small town coastal Maine. Prior to teaching he was a lobster trucker, clam digger, schooner first mate and fishing coop organizer. These experiences provided firsthand knowledge of the traditional fishing communities that would fill his writing. The town office of Prospect presented the Boston Post Cane to Professor Holmes in April 2010.

Selected Bibliography

  • Driftwood: Maine Stories (1972)
  • A Part of the Main; Short Stories of the Maine Coast (1973)
  • Mostly Maine: Short Stories and Other Writings (1977)
  • Two If By Sea: a Novel (1994)

Stories also published in - An Anthology of Maine Literature (1982) - Maine Speaks (1989) - The Maine Reader (1991) - The Quotable Moose (1994),

Holmes, Hannah (1963 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Hannah Holmes, a science and natural history writer, is a resident of South Portland. She is a 1982 Boothbay Harbor Regional High School graduate and a 1989 graduate of the University of Southern Maine. During her college years she wrote for Portland area magazines and newspapers. Following her graduation from USM, she moved to New York where, for four years, she was on the staff of Garbage, an environmental magazine. She then returned to Maine and continued her magazine feature writing career.

Her work has appeared in Sierra, Outside, , and Escape.

She also has been a regular contributor and The Skinny columnist at Discovery Channel Online, for which she's written articles on the Hubble space telescope, life in the deep sea, peanut butter, nuclear power, 'tree spit'(amber), the causes of sneezing, traffic jams, Teflon, and the Latin names for living things, to name a few.

Holmes appeared on NPR's Fresh Air on 12 April 2002. More biographical info and a photo are available from the University of Southern Maine alumni magazine, Mainestream, Spring 2002.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Secret Life of Dust: From the Cosmos to the Kitchen Counter, The Big Consequences of Little Things (2001)
  • Suburban Safari: A Year on the Lawn (2005)
  • The Well-Dressed Ape (2008)
  • Quirk: Brain Science Makes Sense of Your Peculiar Personality (2011)

Selected Links

Hoose, Phillip (1947 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Young Adult

Phil Hoose (pronounced "hose") was born in South Bend, Indiana and grew up in nearby towns. He attended Indiana University and the Yale School of Forestry. He and his family live in Portland, Maine, where Hoose has worked for the Nature Conservancy for over two decades. The Hoose family performed for several years throughout New England as The Hoose Family Band. Their original music was featured on National Public Radio's Weekend Edition.

Hoose is a founder and director of the Children's Music Network, established in 1986 as a resource for parents, educators, and performers of music by and for children.

Selected Bibliography

Books for Adults

  • Necessities: Racial Barriers in American Sports (1989)
  • Hoosiers: The Fabulous Basketball Life of Indiana (1995)
  • The Race to Save the Lord God Bird (2004)
  • Perfect Once Removed: When Baseball Was All the World to Me (2006)
  • Moonbird: A Year on the Wind with the Great Survivor B95 (2012)

Books for Children and Teens

  • It's Our World Too! Stories of Young People Who Are Making a Difference (1993) A Lupine honor book, an American Library Association Notable Book, and winner of the 1993 Christopher Award
  • Hey, Little Ant (1998)
  • We Were There, Too!: Young People in U.S. History (2001)
  • Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice (2009) winner National Book Award, Newbery Honor Book

Selected Links

Hopkins, Pauline (1859 - 1930)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Pauline Hopkins -- playwright, journalist, essayist, novelist and poet, publisher, lecturer, historian, actress, musician; and stenographer for the Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics -- is known as the "Dean of African-American Women Writers."

She was born in Portland, Maine, but moved to Boston as an infant and attended public schools there. After winning a literary competition at the age of 15, she went on to become a prolific writer.

Her first play, "Slaves' Escape: or the Underground Railroad," was produced in Boston in 1880. Her work often featured mixed-race characters and their struggles. Her 1900 novel, Contending Forces, follows the fortunes of a racially mixed family from 1790 Bermuda to late 19th-century Boston, and emphasizes feminist themes of female bonding and empowerment. She also wrote a four-part magazine series on the global African community, "The Dark Races of the Twentieth Century," published in The Voice of the Negro.

Hopkins also founded and was literary editor of the first significant African-American journal of the 20th century, the Boston-based Colored American magazine. She wrote numerous magazine essays and articles (sometimes using the pseudonym Sarah A. Allen), and she became a frequent lecturer on black history.

Selected Bibliography

  • Contending Forces: A Romance Illustrative of Negro Life North and South (1900)
  • Hagar's Daughters: A Story of Southern Class Prejudice (1902)
  • Of One Blood, or, The Hidden Self (1903)
  • A Primer of Facts Pertaining to the Greatness of the African Race and the Possibility of Restoration By Its Descendants (1905)

Selected Resources

  • The Magazine Novels of Pauline Hopkins (1988, Oxford Univ. Press)

Selected Links

Hopkins, William (1924 - 1979)

Genre: General Fiction

William R. Hopkins, born on North Haven Island, attended the University of Maine. In addition to his teaching career on North Haven and in Rockland and Orono, he had a variety of jobs, most of which were related to the maritime world in which he lived. He was a fisherman, a party boat operator, a licensed pilot, and a ferry boat captain.

His stories were included in Killick Stones: A Collection of Maine Island Writing (1987) and The Maine Reader (1991).

He died of cancer in 1979.

Bibliography

  • Freeman Cooper (1970)
  • Better Than Dying (1983)

Ranzoni, Patricia (1940 - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet Patricia Ranzoni was born in Lincoln and grew up in Bucksport. She and her husband returned to the farm she grew up on and raised their three children there.

Her undergraduate and and advanced degrees are from the University of Maine, Orono. She has had a career in education and mental health and says her poetry has evolved from Maine folk tradition.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry Collections

  • Claiming (1995)
  • Settling (2000)
  • Only Human: Poems from the Atlantic Flyway (2005)

Reid, Van ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Reid's family has lived in Edgecomb since the 1800s. He and his wife live with their two children in a house he and his brother built on his family's land.

Reid did not attend college, preferring to develop his own style, but he has worked many jobs, including carpet layer, hospital orderly, theater reviewer and book columnist, and since 1990 has worked at the Maine Coast Book Shop. Reid also performs in local theater.

Reid's books are a series taking place in the late 1800s in coastal Maine. They have been described as having 'lemonade-at-the-fair' freshness; his vivid characters and humour have been compared with John Irving's; and the books are admittedly influenced by Dickens's The Pickwick Papers.

His first book, Cordelia Underwood or the Marvelous Beginnings of the Moosepath League (1998) was first serialized in the Lincoln County Weekly newspaper, from 1995-1997, and was quickly picked up by Penguin Putnam, who offered him a contract for a series of three books, which the editors thought would appeal to readers looking for 'gentle fiction.'

Selected Bibliography

  • Mollie Peer or The Underground Adventures of the Moosepath League (1999)
  • Daniel Plainway or the Holiday Haunting of the Moosepath League (2000)
  • Mrs. Roberto or the Widowy Worries of the Moosepath League, (2003)
  • Fiddler's Green (2004)
  • Peter Loon: A Novel (2002)
  • Moss Farm, or, The Mysterious Missives of the Mossepath League (September 24-30, 1896) (2012)

Rich, Louise Dickinson (1903 - 1991)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Young Adult

Best known for her first book We Took To the Woods (1942), about the Rangeley Lake area, Louise Dickinson Rich was born in Huntington, MA, died in Mattapoisett, MA (14 June 1903 - 9 April 1991), but wrote many books about life in rural northwestern Maine.

She received her B.Sc. from Massachusetts State Teachers' College in 1924 and worked as a high school English teacher before she became a writer.

She and her husband, Ralph Eugene Rich, lived in a camp on the Rapid River in Maine from the time they were married until he died in 1945. After his death, Rich supported herself and her two children through her writing.

Selected Bibliography

  • Happy the Land (1946)
  • Start of the Trail (1949)
  • My Neck of the Woods (1950)
  • Trail to the North (1952)
  • Only Parent (1953)
  • Innocence Under the Elms (1955)
  • The Coast of Maine (1956)
  • Peninsula (1958)
  • First Book of The Early Settlers (1959)
  • First Book of New World Explorers (1960)
  • First Book of The Vikings (1962)
  • First Book of The China Clippers (1962)
  • State O' Maine (1964)
  • First Book of The Fur Trade (1965)
  • First Book of Lumbering (1967)
  • The Kennebec River (1967)
  • Star Island Boy (1968)
  • Three of A Kind (1970)
  • King Philip's War 1675-76: The New England Indians Fight the Colonists (1972)
  • Summer at High Kingdom (1975)

Selected Resources

Richards, Laura Elizabeth (1850 - 1943)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Pulitzer Prize winning author Richards was born 27 Feb. 1850 in Boston, the daughter of Julia Ward Howe and Samuel Gridley Howe, and was educated in Boston schools. She married the architect Henry Richards in 1871 and they moved to Gardiner, Maine in 1876.

Richards' first published works appeared in 1873, nonsense rhymes and nursery songs in St. Nicholas. Her best-known book is Captain January (1890), which sold 300,000 copies and was twice adapted into a film of the same name -- once in 1924 and again in 1936.

Besides writing the books listed below, Richards also edited her father's 2-volume Letters and Journals (1906-1909); she founded the Women's Philanthropic Union in 1895 and was president for 26 years; she was president of the Maine Consumers' League from 1905-1911. She and her husband operated Camp Merryweather for 30 years, a pioneering camp for boys.

She died in Gardiner on 14 Jan. 1943.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sketches and Scraps (1881)
  • Five Mice in a Mouse Trap (1881)
  • The Joyous Story of Toto (1885)
  • Toto's Merry Winter (1887)
  • Queen Hildegarde (1889)
  • In My Nursery (1890)
  • Captain January (1890)
  • Hildegarde's Holiday (1891)
  • Hildegarde's Home (1892)
  • Melody (1893)
  • Glimpses of the French Court (1893)
  • When I Was Your Age (1894)
  • Marie (1894)
  • Nautilus (1895)
  • Jim of Hellas (1895)
  • Five Minute Stories (1895)
  • Narcissa (1896)
  • Isla Heron (1896)
  • Some Say (1896)
  • Hildegarde's Harvest (1897)
  • Three Margarets (1897)
  • Margaret Montfort (1898)
  • Love and Rocks (1898)
  • Rosin the Beau (1898)
  • Peggy (1899)
  • Rita (1900)
  • For Tommy (1900)
  • Quicksilver Sue (1901)
  • Mrs. Tree (1902)
  • The Hurdy Gurdy (1902)
  • The Green Satin Gown (1903)
  • The Golden Windows (1903)
  • The Merryweathers (1904)
  • Mrs. Tree's Will (1905)
  • The Piccolo (1906)
  • The Silver Crown (1906)
  • Grandmother (1907)
  • The Life of Florence Nightingale for Young People (1909)
  • Up To Calvin's (1910)
  • Two Noble Lives (1911)
  • Miss Jimmy (1912)
  • The Little Master (1913)
  • Three Minute Stories (1914)
  • The Life of Julia Ward Howe (1915) (with sister Maud Howe Elliott; won first Pulitzer Prize for biography)
  • The Life of Elizabeth Fry (1916)
  • The Life of Abigail Adams (1917)
  • The Life of Joan of Arc (1919)
  • Honor Bright (1920)
  • The Squire (1923)
  • Oriental Operettas (1924)
  • Star Bright (1927)
  • Laura Bridgman (1928) (biography of her father's most celebrated pupil and the woman for whom Richards herself was named)
  • Stepping Westward (1931) (autobiography)
  • Tirra Lirra (1932)
  • Samuel Gridley Howe (1935)
  • E.A.R. (1936) (about Edwin Arlington Robinson)
  • I Have A Song To Sing You (1938)
  • Jiggle Joggle Jee (2001)

Selected Resources

Rielly, Edward (1943 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Born in Wisconsin, Rielly earned a B.A. from Loras College (Dubuque, IA) in 1968 and a masters and Ph.D. (1974) in English from the Univ. of Notre Dame. He first taught in an elementary school, then a high school, and then at Ambrose College (Davenport, IA).

He moved to Maine in 1978 and lives in Westbrook; he is a professor of English at St. Joseph's College in Standish.

His works include many articles, book reviews, and short stories, as well as poetry, a literature text, and a baseball dictionary.

Selected Bibliography

  • Rain Falling Quietly (1985)
  • Family Portrait (1987)
  • The Furrow's Edge (1987)
  • The Breaking of Glass Horse and other poems (1988)
  • Approaches to Teaching Swift's Gulliver's Travels (1988)
  • My Struggling Soil (1994)
  • Anniversary Haiku (1997)
  • How the Sky Holds the Sun (1998)
  • Baseball: A Dictionary of Popular Culture (2000)
  • cite>Abandoned Farmhouse and Other Haiku (2000)
  • The 1960s (Dec. 2002)
  • Baseball and American Culture: Across the Diamond (2003)
  • A Fine, Safe Journey: Poems About Haying And Other Matters (2003)
  • Ways of Looking: Poems of the Farm (2005)
  • Sitting Bull: a Biography (2007)

Selected Links

Rielly's page on the St. Joseph College Website

Roberts, Kenneth (1885 - 1957)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Roberts was born in Kennebunk's Storer Mansion and in 1938 built a home called Rocky Pastures in Kennebunkport. He graduated from Cornell University in 1908, served in World War I, and was a correspondent for the Saturday Evening Post until he quit in 1928 to write his many historical novels, his books of essays and other non-fiction, most set in New England.

He won a Pulitzer Prize Special Citation in 1957 for "his historical novels which have long contributed to the creation of greater interest in our early American history."

Selected Bibliography

  • Europe's Morning After (1921)
  • Arundel: A Chronicle of the Province of Maine and of the Secret Expedition Against Quebec (1930)
  • Lively Lady: A Chronicle of Arundel, of Privateering, and of the Circular Prison on Dartmoor (1931)
  • Rabble in Arms: A Chronicle of Arundel and the Burgoyne Invasion (1933)
  • Captain Caution: A Chronicle of Arundel (1934)
  • For Authors Only, and Other Gloomy Essays (1935)
  • Northwest Passage (1936)
  • March to Quebec: Journals of the Members of Arnold's expedition (1938)
  • Oliver Wiswell (1940)
  • The Kenneth Roberts Reader (1945)
  • Lydia Bailey (1947)
  • I Wanted to Write (1949)
  • Henry Goss and His Dowsing Rod (1951)
  • Boon Island (1955/1996)
  • The Battle of Cowpens: The Great Morale Builder (1957)

Selected Resources

Robichaud, Gerard (1908 - 2008)

Genre: General Fiction

Novelist Robichaud was born in St. Evariste de Batice, Quebec, and moved to Lewiston as a child. At 12, he enrolled in a Montreal pre-seminary school to study to be a priest. He did not become a priest, but returned to the States and worked in a Connecticut bank before moving to New York City.

From 1941 to 1945 he served in the U.S. Army where his fellow soldiers enjoyed his stories about his family. After the war he returned to New York City.

In the early 1950s he enrolled in a Columbia University writing program. The stories he told his Army buddies and his wife became the basis for his first novel.

Robichaud received an honory degree from the Unversity of Maine in 1991.

Selected Bibliography

  • Papa Martel (1961)
  • The Apple of His Eye (1965)

Selected Links

Robinson, Edward Arlington (1869 - 1935)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, Poetry

Born in the village of Head Tide, Maine (about 10 miles from Wiscasset), and raised in Gardiner, Robinson was a multiple Pulitzer-prize-winning poet and playwright. He became popular after Teddy Roosevelt wrote a favorable review of his second book of poems The Children of the Night (1897) in 1905.

Although Robinson lived most of his adult life in New York City (where he worked for the Customs House for years, one of several jobs arranged by Roosevelt) and in Peterboro, NH (summering in-residence at MacDowell Colony) many of his poems draw on his experiences of and the people he knew in Gardiner.

His poems Miniver Cheevy, Richard Cory, and Tilbury Town are all said to be inspired by people of Gardiner.

Robinson's literary inspirations were the Bible, Shakespeare, Dickens, Thomas Hardy, and Melville. He also liked Sherlock Holmes mysteries and the music of Gilbert and Sullivan.

Selected Bibliography

Poetical Works

  • Children of the Night (1897)
  • The Torrent and the Night Before (1896)
  • Captain Craig and other poems (1902)
  • The Town Down the River (1910)
  • The Man Against the Sky (1916)
  • Merlin (1917)
  • The Three Taverns (1920)
  • Lancelot (1920)
  • Avon's Harvest (1921)
  • Collected Poems (1921) (Pulitzer Prize)
  • Roman Bartholow (1923)
  • The Man Who Died Twice (1924) (Pulitzer Prize 1925)
  • Dionysus in Doubt (1925)
  • Tristram (1927) (Pulitzer Prize)
  • Sonnets, 1889-1927 (1928)
  • Cavender's House (1929)
  • Modred, A Fragment (1929)
  • The Glory of the Nightingales (1930)
  • Selected Poems (1930)
  • Matthias at the Door (1931)

Plays

  • Van Zorn (1914)
  • The Porcupine (1915)

Selected Resources

Selected Resources

Robinson, John (1968 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Born in New York City and educated at Harvard and Brown (1995 M.F.A. in Writing), John Robinson lives in Portland.

Selected Bibliography

  • Kilimanjaro Burning (1997)
  • The Sapphire Sea (2003)
  • A Concise History of Portland, Maine: An Incendiary Record (2007)
  • A Fistful of Diamonds: a Gemstone Thriller (2008)

Robinson, Lewis (1971 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

Born in Natick, Massachusetts, Lewis Robinson grew up in Yarmouth, Maine. He is a graduate of Milton Academy (1989) and of Middlebury College, and he received an M.A. from the Iowa Writers Workshop at the University of Iowa. He lives in Portland, Maine, where he teaches at the University of Southern Maine and and coaches middle school basketball.

He was one of ten writers who received $35,000 Whiting Writers Award in 2003, which is given to emerging writers of "exceptional talent and promise."

Selected Bibliography

  • Officer Friendly and Other Stories (2003)
  • Water Dogs (2009)

Rolde, Neil (1931 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Educated at Philips Andover, Yale, and the Columbia University School of Journalism, Neil Rolde lives in York. He has been variously described as a politician, philanthropist, environmentalist, publisher, health care policy analyst, writer, and historian. He was District 106's (York and part of Kittery) representative in the Maine House for 16 years. He also served as an assistant to Kenneth M. Curtis, governor from 1967 to 1975. Rolde's last political campaign was in 1990 when he ran for U.S. Senator but lost to William Cohen, the incumbent.

He is the owner of Tilbury House, a Gardiner publishing company named after E.A. Robinson's "Tilbury Town."

Rolde is one of Maine's best-known and well-respected historians. In 1998 the Maine Historical Society awarded him the Neal W. Allen Award for "outstanding contributions in the field of Maine history and genealogy."

Selected Bibliography

  • York Is Living History (1975)
  • The Interrupted Forest: A History of Maine's Wildlands (1980)
  • Sir William Pepperrell of Colonial New England (1982)
  • How Augusta Became And Stayed The State Capital (1982)
  • Rio Grande Do Norte: The Story of Maine's Partner State In Brazil: What it's Like, What its Past Has Been and What Are its Ties to Maine (1984)
  • So You Think You Know Maine (1984)
  • Maine: A Narrative History (1990)
  • Your Money or Your Health: America's Cruel, Bureaucratic, and Horrendously Expensive Health Care System: How It Got That Way and What To Do About It (1992)
  • Recommendations for Health System Reform (1995), the final report of the Maine Health Care Reform Commission
  • An Illustrated History Of Maine (1995)
  • The Baxters of Maine: Downeast Visionaries (1997)
  • Unsettled Past, Unsettled Future: The Story of Maine Indians (2004)
  • Maine: Downeast and Different: An Illustrated History (2006)
  • Continental Liar from the State of Maine: James G. Blaine (2007)
  • Maine in the world : stories of some of those from here who went away (2009)
  • Real Political Tales: Short Stories by a Veteran Politician (2014)

Roorbach, William (1953 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Bill Roorbach and his wife and daughter live in Farmington, Maine, which Roorbach says reminds him of the 1950s Connecticut in which he was raised.

Roorbach attended Ithaca College in the 1970s, then played piano in bands, traveled widely, worked as a bartender, and briefly on a cattle ranch. He received his M.F.A. in fiction writing from Columbia University in 1990.

For four years (1991-1995), he taught non-fiction writing at the University of Maine at Farmington. He recently was associate professor in Ohio State University's Master of Fine Art writing program and fiction editor of the Ohio State University Press, quitting this job to write full time in Farmington soon after his daughter was born.

He's also taught at the University of Vermont Summer Writing Program (1995-1999), Stone Coast Writers Conference (1993, 1994), Maine Publishers and Writers Alliance conferences (1992, 1994, 1998, 2001), Cape Cod Writers Conference (2000), and others.

His work, both fiction and nonfiction, has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, Harper's, Granta, New York Magazine, Poets and Writers, The Iowa Review, Witness, Newsday, and others. Honors include a MacDowell Colony fellowship, a Bread Loaf Fellowship in Creative Nonfiction, and two Ohio Arts Councils Grants (both 1999), one in Creative Nonfiction, one in Criticism, as well as a 2002 National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellowship.

Selected Bibliography

  • Summers with Juliet (1992)
  • Writing Life Stories: How to Make Memories into Memoirs, Ideas into Essays, and Life into Literature (1998)
  • Big Bend (2001) (winner of the Flannery O'Connor Award for Short Fiction)
  • The Smallest Color (2001)
  • Into Woods and Other Essays, a sequel to Summers With Juliet (2002)
  • Temple Stream: A Rural Odyssey (2005)
  • Life Among Giants: A Novel (2012) winner, 2013 Maine Literary Awards Book Award for Fiction

Rosen, Kenneth (1940 - )

Genre: Poetry

Ken Rosen lives in Portland, Maine and is the founder of the Stonecoast Writers' Conference in Brunswick, ME.

His poems have appeared in the Paris Review, the Beloit Poetry Journal, Agni, The Massachusetts Review, and Salt Hill Journal.

Rosen has taught at the University of Southern Maine, Syracuse University, the American University in Bulgaria, and the University of Sofia (Bulgaria). He was a Fulbright Professor to Bulgaria in 1998-99, and with Alexander Shurbanov is co-editor of an anthology of contemporary Bulgarian poetry, Dandelion Bone.

Selected Bibliography

  • Whole Horse (1972)
  • Black Leaves (1980)
  • The Hebrew Lion (won 1988 Maine Arts Commission poetry competition)
  • Longfellow Square (1991)
  • Reptile Mind (1993)
  • No Snake, No Paradise (1996)
  • A spy in the House of the Thought Police (1997)
  • The Origins of Tragedy : & Other Poems (2003)

Rozhon, James (1949 - )

Genre: Mystery

Born in the Riverside, California area (8 March 1949), where he now lives, Jim Rozhon lived in Portland, ME for seven years between 1984 and 1991, working as production supervisor for the Portland Press Herald and Maine Sunday Telegram in South Portland.

He has written a series of six mysteries centering on the Collins family:

  • A Matter Of Faith (April 2002)
  • A Slight Difference Of Opinion (July 2002)
  • A Small Fire In The Forest (August 2002)
  • The End Of Time (December 2002)
  • Melodie's Song (May 2003)
  • Sibling Rivalry (2003)

Russo, Richard (1949 - )

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction, Short Stories

Born in Johnstown, NY, on 15 July 1949, and raised in Gloversville, NY, Richard Russo left home to attend the University of Arizona and now lives in Camden, Maine.

He taught English and American literature for 20 years as a college professor, including courses in creative writing at Colby College in Waterville, ME and summer writing seminars at Warren Wilson College in North Carolina.

Russo was national chair of the 1995 Share Our Strength benefit, which raised money for hunger relief through over 300 book readings.

In addition to his novels, he has written several screenplays and a short story collection.

Along with Kate Russo and tom Butler, Russo won the 2013 Maine Literary Awards Excellence in Publishing Award for Interventions, published by Down East Books.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mohawk (1986)
  • The Risk Pool (1988)
  • Nobody's Fool (1993)
  • Straight Man (1997
  • Empire Falls (2001) (2002 Pulitzer Prize)
  • Bridge of Sighs (2007)
  • That Old Cape Magic (2009)
  • Elsewhere (2012)

Selected Links

Tatelbaum, Linda (1947 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Linda Tatelbaum, born on February 28, 1947 in Rochester, New York, now lives in Burkettville (Appleton), Maine in a solar-powered house. She received a B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. from Cornell University. Before moving to Maine in 1977, she lived in New Hampshire and Appalachia. Tatelbaum is Professor Emerita at Colby College in Waterville, retiring in 2007. Tatelbaum founded About Time Press in 1996 to publish her first book.

Selected Bibliography

  • Carrying Water as a Way of Life: A Homesteader's History (1997), which has been widely reviewed and acclaimed
  • Writer on the Rocks: Moving the Impossible (1999) combines writing and actual rock-moving as its twinned themes.
  • Yes and No, was published in 2003.
  • Woman Who Speaks Tree: Confessions of a Tree Hugger, was published in 2008.

Selected Resources

  • For more on Tatelbaum, including excerpts from her books, more reviews, and NPR interviews, visit her website at Colby College
  • My Not-So-Simple Resume at Utne Reader, excerpted from Carrying Water as a Way of Life.
  • Yes! magazine offers an interesting and extensive review.
  • You can read more about her gardening venture (with her husband), which they call Gardening Mutual, in Letter from Appleton.

Tincker, Mary (1833 - 1907)

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Tincker, born in Ellsworth on July 18, 1833, was a novelist of considerable popularity following the Civil War. She was already teaching in the public schools when she was 13, and by the time she was 15, her first work was published. She was a volunteer war nurse during the Civil War, serving in Washington, D.C. After this, she lived in Boston, Mass., and in Italy. Tincker died on December 4, 1907 in Boston.

She was raised Protestant but became Catholic (during a time when Catholics were actively persecuted for their beliefs) and many of her novels reflect her Catholic viewpoint.

She wrote short stories for The Catholic World, which serialized her novel The House of Yorke (1872) in 1871-72; this novel dramatized the actual tarring and feathering of a Catholic pastor by local bigots in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Winged Word; And Other Sketches and Stories (1873)
  • Grapes and Thorns (1874)
  • Six Sunny Months (1877)
  • Signor Monaldini's Niece (part of No Names series 1879)
  • By the Tiber (1881)
  • The Jewel in the Lotos: A Novel (1884)
  • Aurora: A Novel (1886)
  • The Two Coronets (1889)
  • San Salvador (1892)
  • Autumn Leaves: Verse & Story (1898)

Selected Resources

Titherington, Jeanne (1951 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Jeanne Titherington (born 23 May 1951), who grew up in Maine, lived in Rockland and spends summers in Maine, has lived since 1994 in Houston, Texas.

She writes and illustrates children's picture books. She studied art at Pratt Institute and graduated from Portland School of Art (now Maine College of Art).

Selected Bibliography

Authored

  • Big World, Small World (1985)
  • Pumpkin, Pumpkin (1986)
  • A Place for Ben (1987)
  • Where Are You Going, Emma? (1988)
  • A Child's Prayer (1989)
  • Baby's Boat (1992)
  • Sophy and Auntie Pearl (1995)
  • Bonkers Fellini (2001)

Illustrated

  • The story-Teller: Thirteen Tales by Saki (1982)
  • It's Snowing! It's Snowing! by Jack Prelutsky (1984)
  • A Taste for Quiet and Other Disquieting Tales by Judith Gorog (1982)
  • The Chronicles of Pantouflia by Andrew Lang (1981)

Turco, Lewis (1934 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Lew Turco (also uses pseudonym of Wesli Court) -- prolific and internationally known poet, essayist, and literary critic -- is a long-time summer resident of Dresden, Maine, and since 1996 has lived there year-round.

Turco was born on 2 May 1934 in Buffalo, NY, served in the U.S. Navy from 1952 to 1956, and graduated from the University of Connecticut in 1959, whose alumni association honored him with a Distinguished Alumnus Award in 1992. He earned his M.A. from the University of Iowa in 1962 He is Professor Emeritus of English at SUNY in Oswego, NY, where he founded the Program in Writing Arts; he was also founding director of the Cleveland State University Poetry Center.

Turco has won many awards, including the 1986 Melville Cane Award of the Poetry Society of America, the 1990 Cooper House Chapbook Prize from Poet magazine, the first annual Bordighera Bilingual Poetry Prize (with Italian translator Joseph Alessia) in 1997 for his A Book of Fears, the 1999 John Ciardi Award for lifetime achievement in poetry, and an honorary degree in Humane Letters from Ashland University in Ohio in 2000. He was also inducted into the Meriden, Connecticut, Hall of Fame in 1993.

Selected Bibliography

Written as Lewis Turco

  • Day after History: A Selection of Poems (1956)
  • First Poems (1960)
  • Sketches [poems] and Livevil: A Mask (1962)
  • Awaken, Bells, Falling: Poems 1959-1967 (1968)
  • The Book of Forms: A Handbook of Poetics (1968)
  • The Inhabitant (1970)
  • The Literature of New York: A selective bibliography of colonial and native New York State authors (1970)
  • Creative Writing in Poetry (1970)
  • Pocoangelini: A Fantography and Other Poems (1971)
  • The Weed Garden: Poems (1973)
  • Poetry: An Introduction Through Writing (1973)
  • Freshman Composition and Literature (1974)
  • A Cage of Creatures: Poems (1978)
  • Seasons of the Blood: Poems (1980)
  • American Still Lifes: Poems (1981)
  • The Compleat Melancholick: Being a Sequence of 'Found, Composite, and Composed' Poems, based largely upon Robert Burton's The Anatomy of Melancholy (1985)
  • Visions And Revisions Of American Poetry (1986)
  • A Maze of Monsters (1986)
  • The New Book of Forms: A Handbook of Poetics (1986)
  • The Fog: Chamber Opera in One Act (1987; with composer Walter Hekster)
  • The Shifting Web: New & Selected Poems (1989)
  • Dialogue: A Socratic Dialogue on the Art of Writing Dialogue in Fiction (1989)
  • A Family Album: Poems (1990)
  • The Public Poet: Five Lectures on the Art and Craft of Poetry (1991)
  • Murmurs in the Walls (1992)
  • Legends of the Mists (1993)
  • Emily Dickinson, Woman of Letters: Poems and Centos from Lines in Emily Dickinson's Letters (1993)
  • How to Write a Million 1995
  • Bordello: PoemPrints (1996; with printmaker George O'Connell)
  • Shaking the Family Tree: A Remembrance (1998)
  • A Book of Fears (1998; translated into Italian by Joseph Alessia)
  • The Life and Poetry of Manoah Bodman, Bard of the Berkshires (1999; edited and with introduction by Turco)
  • The Book of Literary Terms: The Genres of Fiction, Drama, Nonfiction, Literary Criticism and Scholarship (1999)
  • The Green Maces of Autumn: Voices in an Old Maine House (2002)
  • The Book of Dialogue: How to Write Effective Conversation in Fiction, Screenplays, Drama, and Poetry (2004)
  • A Sheaf of Leaves: Literary Memoirs (2004)
  • The Collected Lyrics of Wesli Court, 1953-2004 (2004)
  • Fantaseers, A Book of Memories (2005)
  • The Museum of Ordinary People and Other Stories (2007)
  • Fearful Pleasures: The Complete Poems of Lewis Turco (2007)

Written as Wesli Court

  • The Airs of Wales (1981)
  • Murgatroyd and Mabel (1978)
  • Courses in Lambents: Poems (1977)
  • Curses and Laments (1978)

Selected Links

Turner, Philip (1922 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Philip Turner was raised on a dairy and potato farm in Mapleton. He received his bachelors degree from the University of Maine in 1948. After earning a doctorate in soil science and business administration from Michigan State University and working for the Dupont Corporation, he returned to Maine in 1960 to manage the Aroostook Federation of Farmers in Caribou.

He is well-known for his historical novel I Am General Eaton, whose subject first interested Turner during a title search to his property in Caribou, which is on a portion of the original Eaton Land Grant. After the book was published, the Turners embarked on a 5-month tour of Navy and Marine bases along the East Coast, at which both the author and his book were well-received.

Selected Bibliography

  • Affie: The story about the people who were the Aroostook Federation of Farmers (1983)
  • Rooster: The Story of Aroostook County (1988)
  • First John: King of the Mountain (1991)
  • Loring (1994?)
  • I Am General Eaton! (1997)
  • A New Day Dawning, Yet They Hung Her in Hartland (1999)
  • Ladies First - Saints All (2003)
  • A Rebel Redeemed (2007)

Sadoff, Ira (1945 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry, Short Stories

Poet, novelist, short story writer, essayist, and teacher Ira Sadoff lives in Hallowell.

Sadoff is Arthur Jeremiah Roberts Professor of Literature at Colby College, where he's taught since 1977.

He was born in Brooklyn, NY, on 7 March 1945, raised in the Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn, earned a B.A. from Cornell University in industrial and labor relations (1966) and an M.F.A. in 1968 from the University of Oregon. He taught at Hobart & Smith Colleges (NY), Antioch College, and Hampshire College before Colby, and co-founded the mostly poetry Seneca Review in 1970 with James Crenner.

Sadoff won the Poetry Society of America George Bogin Memorial Award in 1996 and the American Poetry Review Jerome J. Shestack Prize in 1997. His article on neo-formalism appears in the Jan/Feb 1990 issue of American Poetry Review.

Selected Bibliography

  • Settling Down (1975)
  • Palm Reading in Winter (1978)
  • Maine: Nine Poems (1981)
  • Uncoupling (1982) (a novel)
  • A Northern Calendar (1982)
  • Emotional Traffic: Poems (1989/90)
  • An Ira Sadoff Reader: Selected Poetry and Prose (1992)
  • Grazing: Poems (1998)
  • Barter (2003)
  • History Matters : Contemporary Poetry On The Margins Of American Culture (c2009)
  • True Faith: Poems (2012)
  • Country, Living: A Collection of Poems (2020)

St. Jarre, Kevin (1968 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery, Short Stories

Maine native Kevin St. Jarre, born July 26, 1968, was raised in Madawaska now teaches at Cape Elizabeth High School and University of Maine at Farmington. He worked in U.S. Army intelligence for six years, serving in Germany, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq. He presents workshops at education forums and on topics such as leadership, learning communities, data collection, standards and rubrics, time and resource management.

St. Jarre is a novelist, poet, short story writer, and author of works of narrative non-fiction. Under the pen name Michael Hawke, he has written a three-book series of military thrillers whose milieu is the war on terror.

Selected Bibliography

Night Stalkers trilogy

  • Night Stalkers (2005)
  • Night Stalkers: Coercion (2005)
  • Night Stalkers: Homefront (2006)
  • (2020)

Selected Links

St. Louis, Lyla (1918 - 2006)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Lyla (Smith) St. Louis spent her childhood on a farm in Town Hill, Maine near Bar Harbor. After graduating from high school, she worked as a secretary and cashier until her 1943 marriage to Thomas St. Louis. In 1948 they moved to Freeport. From 1965 until her retirement in 2000, she worked as a teacher's assistant in the Freeport school system. St. Louis died on May 6, 2006.

St. Louis wrote articles for newspapers and for Down East magazine.

Selected Bibliogrpahy

  • A Warden's Way: The Story of Lyle Smith, Maine's 'Flying Warden' (1991) (also issued as A Warden's Way: The Life of Lyle Smith of Mount Desert Island), is a biography of her father, a game warden on Mt. Desert.

Sanders, Michael (1961 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Michael Sanders, a resident of Brunswick, was an editor before turning to writing as his primary career although he also imported rugs from Russia and Ukraine, writing novels about the experience, and worked as a bookseller.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Yard: Building a Destroyer at Bath Iron Works (1999)
  • From Here, You Can't See Paris: Seasons of a French Village and its Restaurant (2002)
  • Families of the Vine: Seasons Among the Winemakers of Southwest France (2005)
  • Fresh from Maine: Recipes and Stories from the State's Best Chefs (2012)
  • Drinking in Maine: 50 Cocktails, concoctions, and Drinks from our Best Artisanal Producers and Restaurants (2012)

Selected Links

Nangle, Hilary (1958 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Nangle is a freelance travel and sports writer who has lived in Maine since childhood; she grew up in the Portland area and now lives in Waldoboro with her husband, photographer Tom Nangle.

She attended College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass. (class of 1980), and started a graduate degree in Middle Eastern studies before dropping out to work for whitewater rafting companies and ski resorts. She was managing editor for Gourmet News, a trade publication, from 1992-1995 and features editor for the Brunswick Times Record newspaper from 1995-1998.

Nangle is the contract editor for the Maine Office of Tourism's "Maine Invites You" guide.

She won the 2003 Harold S. Hirsch Award for Excellence in Snowsports Journalism for magazines, and the Maine Media Women's 1998 Communicator of Achievement Award. She's featured monthly as travel expert on the WCSH6 TV talk show "207."

Selected Bibliography

  • Moon Handbook's Acadia National Park, 2008
  • Moon Handbook's Maine, 2008
  • Moon Handbook's Moon Coastal Maine, 2008

Selected Links

Mars, Peter ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Peter Mars is a writer of crime fiction and non-fiction. He is a native of Brookline, Massachusetts and was a Boston area policeman for twelve years. He served several years with the Yarmouth Police Department on Cape Cod before moving to Maine, where he was Chief of Administrative Services for the Kennebec County Sheriff's Office until his retirement in 1997. He graduated from Northeastern University with a degree in criminal justice and police science, and received a masters in public administration and a doctorate in sociology from Columbia University. He has lived since 1980 in North Monmouth.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Tunnel, (1998)
  • A Taste for Money (1999)
  • The Key (2000)
  • The Best Suit in Town: A Great Generation of Cops (2001)
  • The Chaplain 2004

Martin, Sarah (1963 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Sarah Beth Martin (a pen name) was born and grew up in Weston, Massachusetts (outside Boston) and lives in Yarmouth, Maine.

In high school, she painted oil portraits for neighborhood clients and participated in local art shows. After high school she attended technical school, working as a drafter. In 1990, she relocated to Maine and while attending the University of Southern Maine, submitted her stories to magazines.

Her first published story appeared in Mostly Maine: A Writer's Journal, and since then she has been published in Pearl, West Wind Review, and Animus, among others. She also began a short story quarterly called Foliage in 1998, which she published for two years.

In fall 2003, she published her first novel, The One True Ocean, about a young widow seeking solace from her grief who returns to her hometown of fictional Cape Wood, in southern Maine. She is working on another novel and a collection of short stories.

Selected Bibliography

  • The One True Ocean (2003)

Neal, John (1793 - 1876)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

John Neal was an important voice in 19th-century literature as a writer and critic who wrote one of the earliest histories of American literature.

Born in Portland, he moved to Baltimore when he was 21 to start a dry goods business. When the business failed, he became the editor of The Portico, a monthly literary magazine that also had a short life.

Neal's first novel, Keep Cool, Written in Hot Weather, by Somebody M.D.C., &c., &c., &c. Author of Sundry Works of Great Merit, Never Published, or Read, From His Story. Reviewed by Himself --- "Esquire", was published in 1817.

The next year he published two narrative poems, "Battle of the Niagara, a Poem, without Notes," and "Goldau, or, the Maniac Harper," for which he used the pen name Jehu O'Cataract.

Shortly after Neal traveled to England in 1823, he met Jeremy Bentham, the philosopher, who hired him as his secretary. While in England, Neal wrote a series of five articles on 135 American writers for Blackwood's Magazine. This is noteworthy, as the Blackwood editors had no use for American writers or writing.

Although riddled with error, the series is considered the first effort to chronicle and explain American literature and was reprinted as American Writers in 1937.

When Neal returned to Portland in 1827, he opened the city's first gymnasium as he had become a strong proponent of physical well being as a means of advancing social and political well being. Neal, who was an early advocate for equal rights for minorities and women, severed his relationship with the gym when the majority of members would not support his nomination of African-Americans for membership. He established gymnasiums in other Maine cities and taught boxing and bowling at Bowdoin College.

In addition to his writing, Neal was also known as an editor, architect, lawyer, historian, and women's rights advocate. He wrote numerous magazine articles on American artists and is considered one of the United States' first major art critics.

Although a strong opponent of dueling, he was not against using his fist or his physical strength to challenge an opponent. One of the more frequently cited Neal stories is one in which he, at 79 years old, is noted for throwing a defiant cigar-smoking passenger off a street car.

Selected Bibliography

  • Otho: A Tragedy in Five Acts, (1819)
  • A History of the American Revolution: Comprehending all the Principal Events Both in the Field and in the Cabinet, (1819)
  • Logan: A Family History, (1822)
  • Errata: or The Works of Will. Adams, (1823)
  • Seventy-Six, (1823)
  • Randolph, a Novel, (1823)
  • Brother Jonathan, or The New Englander, (1825)
  • Rachel Dye: A North American Story, (1828)
  • Address Delivered Before the Portland Association for the Promotion of Temperance, (1829)
  • City of Portland: Being a General Review of the Proceedings Heretofore Had, in the Town of Portland, on the Subject of a City Government; With the Petitions and Signatures, and Remarks Thereon, (1829)
  • Authorship, A Tale, (1830)
  • The Down-Easters, (1833)
  • Man: a Discourse, Before the United Brothers' Society of Brown University, September 4, 1838, (1838)
  • John Beedle's Sleigh Ride, Courtship, and Marriage, (1841)
  • True Womanhood: a Tale, (1859)
  • One More Word: Intended for the Reasoning and Thoughtful Among Unbelievers, (1854)
  • Account of the Great Conflagration in Portland, (1866)
  • Wandering Recollections of a Somewhat Busy Life, (1869 autobiography)
  • Great Mysteries and Little Plagues, (1870)
  • Portland Illustrated, (1874)
  • The Moose-Hunter, or, Life in the Maine Woods. Beadle's dime novels; no. 72, (1864)

Biographical and critical studies of John Neal

  • A Down-East Yankee from the District of Maine, by Windsor Pratt Daggett, A. J. Houston, (1920)
  • The Life of John Neal, 1793-1876,Irving Trefethen Richards, (thesis), (1925)
  • Observations on American Art; Selections from the Writings of John Neal (1793-1876), edited with notes by Harold Edward Dickson, Pennsylvania State College, (1943)
  • That Wild Fellow John Neal and the American Literary Revolution, by Benjamin Lease, University of Chicago Press, (1972)
  • The Genius of John Neal: Selections from His Writings, by Benjamin Lease and Hans-Joachim Lang, Lang, (1978)

Mason, Cherie (1926 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Children's book writer Cherie Mason settled on Deer Isle after moving to Maine from Chicago. In addition to being a writer, she's been an advertising executive, an actress, and an environmental journalist. She serves on the Deer Isle Conservation Commission and considers herself "an evangelist for the environment and wild animals."

Selected Bibliography

  • Wild Fox: A True Story, (1993/2004) (Lupine Award winner 1994)
  • Everybody's Somebody's Lunch, (1998)

Selected Links

Nearing, Helen (1904 - 1995)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Helen Nearing was born in Ridgewood, NJ, the middle child of intellectual middle-class parents. Helen travelled widely as a child and teenager, took music lessons, and was well-educated. Her early life is described in detail in her book Loving and Leaving the Good Life.

Helen met Scott Nearing briefly in 1921, then again in 1928, and they were together from that time on, only marrying in 1947 when Scott's first wife, Nellie Seeds, from whom he was separated, died. They left New York City in 1932 to live in rural southern Vermont, where they homesteaded and ran a maple-sugaring business for 19 years. They moved to Harborside, Maine in 1952, where they again built their own house and outbuildings and began a business raising blueberries. Their homesteading days are also well-chronicled in their books.

Helen and Scott Nearing wrote a regular column in Mother Earth News during the 1960s and 1970s.

Their home in Harborside, Forest Farm, is now the Good Life Center, which hosts Monday night meetings, free tours, and workshops.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Good Life Album of Helen and Scott Nearing, (1974)
  • Simple Food for the Good Life, (1980)
  • Wise Words on the Good Life: An Anthology of Quotations, (1980)
  • Our Home Made of Stone: Building in our 70s and 90s, (1983)
  • The Good Life: Helen and Scott Nearing's Sixty Years of Self-Sufficient Living, (1989)
  • Loving and Leaving the Good Life (1992)
  • Light on Aging and Dying: Wise Words (1995)

Selected Resources

  • One Light Alone: a guru meditation on the good death of Helen Nearing by Ellen LaConte, Loose Leaf Press, (1996)

Selected Links

McCloskey, Robert (1914 - 2003)

Genre: Children's Literature

Born in Hamilton, Ohio, McCloskey attended Vesper George Art School in Boston, served in World War II, and eventually moved to Maine with his wife Peggy, whose mother, children's author Ruth Sawyer, lived in Hancock, Maine.

McCloskey was the winner of several Caldecott Medals and Honors.

An archive of manuscripts, various language editions, ephemera, and original artwork by McCloskey is in the May Massee collection at Emporia State University in Kansas.

McCloskey died on Deer Island, Maine, on 30 June, 2003, at the age of 88.

Selected Bibliography

  • Lentil, (1940/1999)
  • Make Way for Ducklings, (1941) (1942 Caldecott Medal winner)
  • Homer Price, (1943/1999)
  • Blueberries for Sal, (1948/1999)
  • Centerburg Tales, (1951/1999)
  • One Morning in Maine, (1952/1999) (Caldecott Honor book)
  • Journey Cake, Ho!, (1953) (Caldecott Honor book)
  • Time of Wonder, (1957/1999) (1958 Caldecott Medal winner)
  • Henry Reed, Inc, (1958)
  • Burt Dow, Deep Water Man: A Tale of the Sea in the Classic Tradition, (1963)
  • The World of Robert McCloskey, (1998)

Selected Resources

Nearing, Scott (1883 - 1983)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Scott Nearing -- economist, homesteader, orator, and prolific writer -- was born to a wealthy family in a Pennsylvania mining town (Morris Run) in 1883.

By 1905, he was speaking out on liberal issues, including the treatment and working conditions of miners. He graduated from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton College of Economics in 1906 and taught at the school until he was fired in 1915 for his outspoken opposition to child labor.

He taught in 1916-1917 at the Univ. of Toledo in Ohio -- the only college that would take him -- until he was also fired from this school for his anti-war stance. Nearing's private papers were seized by the Justice Department (pre-FBI) in 1916. He was charged under the Espionage Act in 1917 for his opposition to WWI, as evidenced in his tract, The Great Madness, and was tried in Feb. 1919. Nearing saw the trial as a chance to educate and he provided most of his own defense; he was acquitted after 30 hours of deliberation.

Nearing started his own news service, Federated Press, and his World Events newsletter.

Many of his books are self-published.

Nearing joined the Socialist party in 1917 and ran for Congress in 1918, losing by a large margin to his challenger. He left the Socialist party in 1922 and joined the Communist party in 1927, but left them in 1930, when his writings were deemed to clash with Lenin's writings.

Scott Nearing and Helen Knothe (Nearing) met briefly in 1921, then again in 1928, and they were together from that time on, only marrying in 1947 when Scott's first wife, Nellie Seeds, from whom he was separated, died. They left New York City in 1932 to live in rural southern Vermont, where they homesteaded and ran a maple-sugaring business for 19 years.

They moved to Harborside, Maine, in 1952, where they again built their own house and outbuildings and began a business raising blueberries. Their homesteading days are well-chronicled in their books.

Scott died by self-starvation at Harborside on August 24, 1983.

The Nearing's home in Harborside, Forest Farm, is now the Good Life Center.

Selected Bibliography

  • Economics (1908; with Frank D. Watson)
  • Social Adjustment (1911)
  • The Solution of the Child Labor Problem (1911)
  • The Super Race (1912)
  • Women and Social Progress (1912 with Nellie Seeds Nearing)
  • Social Sanity (1913)
  • Financing the Wage Earner's Family (1913)
  • Wages in the United States (1914)
  • Reducing the Cost of Living (1914)
  • Income (1915)
  • Anthracite: An Instance of Natural Resource Monopoly (1915)
  • The New Education (1915)
  • Social Religion (1916)
  • Poverty and Riches (1916)
  • Civics (1916 with Jessie Field)
  • The Germs of War: A Study in Preparedness (1916)
  • The Great Madness (1917; a 32-page pamphlet against WWI)
  • The Elements of Economics (1918)
  • The Trial of Scott Nearing and the American Socialist Society (1919)
  • The American Empire (1921)
  • The Next Step (1922)
  • Oil and the Germs of War (1923)
  • Educational Frontiers (1925)
  • Dollar Diplomacy (1925; with Joseph Freeman)
  • Education in Soviet Russia (1926)
  • The British General Strike (1926)
  • Whither China: An Economic Interpretation of Recent Events in the Far East (1927)
  • The Economic Organization of the Soviet Union (1927)
  • Where is Civilization Going? (1927)
  • Black America (1929)
  • The Twilight of Empire: An Economic Interpretation of Imperialist Cycles (1930)
  • War: Organized Destruction and Mass Murder by Civilized Nations (1931)
  • Must We Starve? (1932)
  • Free Born: An Unpublishable Novel (1932)
  • Fascism (1933)
  • United World (1945)
  • The Soviet Union as a World Power (1945)
  • Democracy is Not Enough (1945)
  • The Tragedy of Empire (1945)
  • War or Peace? (1946)
  • The Revolution of Our Time (1947)
  • Economics for the Power Age (1952)
  • Man's Search for the Good Life (1954)
  • To Promote the General Welfare (1956)
  • Soviet Education (1958)
  • Freedom: Promise and Menace (1961)
  • Economic Crisis in the United States (1962)
  • Socialism in Practice (1962)
  • Cuba and Latin America (1963)
  • The Conscience of a Radical (1965)
  • The Making of a Radical (1972)
  • Civilization and Beyond (1975)

Books co-authored by Scott and Helen Nearing: - The Maple Sugar Book (1950) - Living the Good Life (1954) - USA Today: Educational Excursions Through Darkest America (1955) - The Brave New World (1958) - Socialists Around the World (1958) - The Right To Travel (1959) - Building and Using Our Sun-Heated Greenhouse: Grow Vegetables Year-Round (1977) - Continuing the Good Life: Half A Century of Homesteading (1979)

Selected References

  • The Nearing Case: The Limitation of Academic Freedom at the University of Pennsylvania by Act of the Board of Trustees, June 14, 1915; a brief of facts and opinions, by Lightner Witmer (1974)
  • Scott Nearing: Apostle of American Radicalism, by Stephen Whitfield (1974)
  • A Scott Nearing Reader: The Good Life in Bad Times, edited by Steve Sherman (1989)
  • Scott Nearing An Intellectual Biography, by John A. Saltmarsh (1991)
  • Scott Nearing: The Making of a Homesteader, by John A. Saltmarsh (1998)
  • Scott Nearing: An American Radical, An American Homesteader, An Americal Original, by John A. Saltmarsh

Selected Links

McCutcheon, Marc (1957 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

McCutcheon, a Maine native, writes children's books and non-fiction reference works. He lives in South Portland with his wife and two children.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Compass in Your Nose and Other Astonishing Facts About Humans, (1989)
  • Descriptionary: A Thematic Dictionary, (1992/2005 - 3rd ed)
  • The Writers Guide to Everyday Life from Prohibition through WWII, (1993/1995)
  • Roget's Super Thesaurus, (1995/1998/2003)
  • Grandfather's Christmas Camp, (1995)
  • The Writer's Digest Sourcebook for Building Believable Characters, (1996/2000)
  • The Wordsworth Word Finder, (1997)
  • The Beast in You!: Activities & Questions to Explore Evolution, (1999)
  • The Facts On File Student's Thesaurus, (1999/2005)
  • The Writers Guide to Everyday Life in the 1800s: A Guide for Writers, Students & Historians, (2001)
  • Damn! Why Didn't I Write That?: How Ordinary People are Raking In Over $100,000 or More Writing Nonfiction Books and How You Can Too, (2001)
  • The Space Book: Activities for Experiencing the Universe and the Night Sky, (2002)
  • The Kid Who Named Pluto: And the Stories of Other Extraordinary Young People in Science, (2004

Nelson, James (1962 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Jim Nelson was born and raised in Lewiston, by parents who both taught English, his father at Bates College and his mother at Lewiston High School. Nelson left Maine at eighteen to travel around the country. After graduating from UCLA Film School, he worked for several years in Hollywood, hoping to become a screenwriter, then "ran away to sea," working as a professional sailor and rigger on ships around the U.S. He eventually returned to Maine and lives in South Harpswell with his wife (also a former traditional sailor) and children.

Selected Bibliography

Fiction Titles

The Biddlecomb Saga/The Revolution At Sea Saga

  • By Force of Arms (1996)
  • The Maddest Idea (1997)
  • The Continental Risque (1998)
  • Lords of the Ocean (1999)
  • All the Brave Fellows (2000)

The Brethren of the Coast Trilogy

  • The Guardship (2000)
  • The Blackbirder (2001)
  • The Pirate Round (2002)

The Bowater Series:

  • Glory in the Name: A Novel of the Confederate Navy (2003)
  • Thieves of Mercy: A Novel of the Civil War at Sea (2005)
  • The Only Life that Mattered (2004), Originally titled The Sweet Trade (2002)published under the pseudonym "Elizabeth Garrett",
  • Benedict Arnold's Navy (2006)

Non-Fiction Titles

  • Reign of Iron: The Story of the First Battling Ironclads, the Monitor and the Merrimack (2004).
  • George Washington's Secret Navy: How the American Revolution Went to Sea, (2008) (winner of the 2009 Samuel Eliot Morison Award for Naval Literature)

Nichols, Jim (1950 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

Jim Nichols is a native Mainer, born in Brunswick and raised in Freeport, who now lives in Warren with his wife. When he's not writing, he works for Telford Aviation at the airport in Owls Head.

In 2000, Nichols' short story "Slow Monkeys" won the Willamette Fiction Prize. He won fifth prize in 1997 for a story in American Fiction Volume 9 -- The Best Unpublished Short Stories by Emerging Writers (Joyce Carol Oates was guest judge), and in 1993 won second prize for a story, "Jon-Clod,", submitted to the River City Writing Awards for Fiction.

His short stories have appeared in Esquire, Puckerbrush review, Paris Transcontinental, ELF, River City, and other magazines.

Selected Bibliography

  • Slow Monkey and Other Stories (2002) a story collection, features ordinary people in ordinary settings living extraordinary lives.
  • Hull Creek (2012)
  • Closer all the Time (2016)
  • Blue Summer (2020)

Nye, Edgar (Bill) (1850 - 1896)

Genre: General Fiction

Edgar (Bill) Nye was a well-known newspaperman and humorist born in Shirley, Maine; he spent much of his life out west and in New York. He was a contemporary of Mark Twain and is known for the same type of "frontier" humor.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bill Nye and Boomerang, or, the Tale of a Meek-Eyed Mule (1881)
  • Forty Liars, and Other Lies (1882)
  • Baled Hay: A Drier Book than Walt Whitman's "Leaves O' Grass" (1884)
  • Remarks by Bill Nye (1886)
  • Thinks (1888)
  • Bill Nye's Chestnuts, Old and New (1888)
  • Bill Nye's Remarks (1891)
  • Sparks from the Pen of Bill Nye (1892)
  • Bill Nye's History of the United States (1894)
  • Bill Nye's Sparks (1896)
  • Bill Nye's History of England from the Druids to the Reign of Henry VIII (1896)
  • A Guest at the Ludlow, and other stories (1896)
  • Nye and Riley's Wit and Humor (Poems and Yarns) (1900) (with James Whitcomb Riley)
  • Bill Nye's Comic History of England (1906)
  • Bill Nye's Red Book (1906)
  • Bill Nye, His Own Life Story (1926)

Selected Resources

  • Bill Nye: The Western Writings (1976; by D.B. Kesterson)
  • The Best of Bill Nye's Humor: Selections from the Nineteenth-Century Humorist (1972; ed. Louis Hasley)

O'Brien, Anne (1952 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Annie O'Brien lives on Peaks Island, Maine, and is a children's book writer and illustrator. She grew up in a bi-cultural society as the daughter of American medical missionaries in Korea, and she has taught Korean at the Korean United Methodist Church in Portland.

She earned her B.A. (cum laude) from Mount Holyoke College in 1975. She is active in diversity education in schools nationwide.

Selected Bibliography

Author

  • Where's My Truck? (1985)
  • Come Play with Us (1985)
  • I'm Not Tired (1985)
  • I Want That! (1985)
  • Don't Say No! (1986)
  • I Don't Want to Go (1986)
  • It Hurts! (1986)
  • It's Hard to Wait (1986)
  • The Princess and the Beggar: A Korean Folktale (adapted and illustrated by O'Brien, 1993)
  • The Legend of Hong Kil Dong: The Robin Hood of Korea (2006)
  • After Gandhi: One Hundred Years of Nonviolent Resistance (with Perry Edmond O'Brien) (2009)
  • A Path of Stars (2012)

Illustrator

  • The Mystery of the Haunted Cabin (by Judy Delton, 1986)
  • Jamaica's Find (by Juanita Havill, 1986/2004)
  • Jamaica Tag-Along (by Juanita Havill, 1989/2003)
  • Talking Walls and the Talking Walls Activity Guide (both by Margy Burns Knight, 1992)
  • Who Belongs Here: An American Story (by Margy Burns Knight, 1993)
  • Jamaica and Brianna (by Juanita Havill, 1993)
  • Who Belongs Here Activity Guide (by Margy Burns Knight, 1994)
  • Welcoming Babies (by Margy Burns Knight, 1994)
  • Jamaica's Blue Marker (by Juanita Havill, 1995)
  • Talking Walls: The Stories Continue (by Margy Burns Knight, 1996)
  • Jouanah, a Hmong Cinderella (adapted by Jewell R. Coburn, 1996)
  • Jamaica and the Substitute Teacher (by Juanita Havill, 1999)
  • Africa is Not a Country (by Margy Burns Knight and Mark Melnicove, 2000)
  • Briana, Jamaica, and the Dance of Spring (by Juanita Havill, 2002)
  • Uncommon Traveler: Mary Kingsley in Africa (2003); with Don Brown, Juanita Havill)
  • Jamaica is Thankful (By Juanita Havill) (2009)

Selected Links

Peavey, Elizabeth (1959 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Portland resident Elizabeth Peavey grew up in Maine, left, and returned.

She's a columnist, journalist, and editor, serving as contributing editor for Down East magazine from 1997 to the present. Her book, Maine and Me: Ten Years of Down East Adventures (2004), is a compilation of her writing for Down East magazine.

Her second book, Outta My Way: An Odd Life Lived Loudly, is a collection of humourous essays written for the Casco Bay Weekly.

She also wrote the chapter on Maine for Fodor's Road Guide USA (2001).

Peavey teaches public speaking at University of Southern Maine and writing workshops for Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance. Previously, she taught creative nonfiction at the University of Maine at Farmington. She writes a monthly column for The Bollard, a Portland publication.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine & Me: Ten Years of Down East Adventures (2004)
  • Outta My Way (2005)
  • A Year in the Woods of Maine: Paintings by Margeurite Robichaux (2009)
  • My Mother's Clothes Are Not My Mother (play) (2012) winner, Maine Literary Awards Drama Award

Selected Links

McKinley, Robin (1952 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Young Adult

Newbery Award-winning author McKinley was Born in Warren, Ohio, the daughter of a naval officer. Until recently, she lived in a 200-year-old cottage in Brunswick, ME. She now lives in Hampshire, England with her husband, the English writer Peter Dickinson.

McKinley graduated Summa Cum Laude from Bowdoin College in 1975 received an honorary doctorate from Bowdoin in 1986.

Although her first book was published when she was only 26, McKinley has held a wide array of other jobs, including editor and transcriber, bookstore clerk, editorial assistant, and barn manager.

Selected Bibliography

  • Beauty, (1978)
  • Door in the Hedge, (1981)
  • The Blue Sword, (1982)
  • The Hero and the Crown, (1985) (1985 Newbery Medal winner)
  • Tales From The Jungle Book, (1985)
  • Black Beauty, (1986)
  • Imaginary Lands, (ed., 1986)
  • The Outlaws of Sherwood, (1988)
  • My Father is in the Navy, (1992)
  • Rowan, (1992)
  • Deerskin, (1993)
  • A Knot in the Grain And Other Stories, (1996)
  • Rose Daughter, (1999)
  • The Stone Fey, (1998)
  • Spindle's End, (2000)
  • Sunshine, (2003)
  • Chalice (2008)

Selected Links

Oliver, Teagan (1967 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Romance Novel

Teagan Oliver is a pen name for Bethany Oliver, a native Mainer (born in Brunswick, raised in Harpswell) and self-proclaimed "island girl" who still lives in midcoast Maine. Before she started her career as a fiction writer, she worked for DeLorme for several years promoting and selling non-fiction mapping books. Her articles have appeared in trade and regional publications, including her short story "Homeport," which was published in Portland magazine in 1998.

She is a founding member and past president of Maine Romance Writers, and past president of Romance Writers of America (2001-2003).

She gives workshops at writers' conferences on the subjects of author promotion, writing development, and goal setting.

Selected Bibliography

  • Obsidian (2007)
  • The Three Truths of Katie Talmadge (2007)

Selected Links

Ogilvie, Elisabeth (1917 - 2006)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Young Adult

Ogilvie was born in Boston and raised in Dorchester and Wollaston, MA, summering on the island of Criehaven in Maine. She lived in Cushing, Maine, and wintered in a farmhouse on 33 acres on Gay Island, off Friendship, where she lived with longtime companion (and another Maine writer) Dorothy Simpson for many years. Ogilvie wrote 46 adult, young adult, and children's books, most of them set in Maine, although her Jennie Glenroy series is set in Scotland, the place she called her second favorite after Maine.

Selected Bibiliography

Adult Titles

  • High Tide at Noon (1944), the first of the Bennett Island families series
  • Storm Tide (1945), second in Bennett Island series
  • The Ebbing Tide (1947), third in Bennett Island series
  • Rowan Head (1949)
  • The Dawning of the Day (1954/1999), 4th in Bennett Island series, romantic suspense fiction set on a remote island off the coast of Maine, involving a young war widow overcoming the prejudice of family rivalries
  • No Evil Angel (1956)
  • The Witch Door (1959)
  • Call Home the Heart (1962)
  • There May Be Heaven (1964)
  • The Seasons Hereafter (1966), 5th in Bennett Island series
  • Waters on a Starry Night( (1968)
  • Bellwood (1969)
  • The Face of Innocence (1970)
  • A Theme for Reason (1970)
  • Weep & Know Why (1972)
  • Strawberries in the Sea (1973/1999), 6th in Bennett Island series, the story of a young woman on the coast of Maine, who can work as hard as any man, and love as passionately as any woman
  • Image of a Lover (1974): Seafair Bell's summer idyll on Drummond's Island, off Maine, begins with songs, swims, and seafood, but before long the golden summer will end in murder and madness
  • Where the Lost Aprils Are( (1975)
  • The Dreaming Swimmer (1976), romantic suspense
  • An Answer in the Tide (1978), 7th in Bennett Island series
  • A Dancer in Yellow (1979)
  • The Devil in Tartan (1980)
  • The Silent Ones (1981)
  • The Road to Nowhere (1983)
  • Jennie About to Be (1984), set in Scotland
  • The World of Jennie G. (1986), 2nd in the Jennie series, set in Maine in early 1800s
  • The Summer of the Osprey (1987), 8th in Bennett Island series, in which a mysterious, wealthy lobsterman comes to Bennett Island to catch lobsters for fun, but island residents become suspicious of his motives
  • When the Music Stopped (1989), suspense novel, set in the sleepy seaside village of Job's Harbor, Maine; scandals erupt as an incident that took place many years ago is again brought to life
  • Jennie Glenroy (1993), 3rd in the Jennie series; setting is based on Thomaston, Maine
  • The Day Before Winter (1997), 9th in Bennett Island series.

Books for Children

  • Whistle for the Wind (1954; takes place in early 1800s)
  • Blueberry Summer (1956; romance of a girl on the Maine coast)
  • The Fabulous Year (1958)
  • How Wide the Heart (1959)
  • The Young Islanders (1960)
  • Becky's Island (1961)
  • Turn Around Twice (1962)
  • Ceiling of Amber (1964)
  • Masquerade at Sea House (1965)
  • The Pigeon Pair (1967)
  • Come Aboard & Bring Your Dory! (1969)
  • Beautiful Girl (1980)

Selected Resources

  • My World is An Island (1950/1990) an autobiography
  • A Mug-Up with Elisabeth: A Companion for Readers of Elisabeth Ogilvie (2001), by Marilyn Westervelt and Melissa Hayes includes a biography, samples from her early writings, and synopses of all her published works.

Selected Resources

Oliver, Sandra ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Food historian Sandy Oliver lives on Isleboro and is the editor and publisher of the quarterly newsletter Food History News.

She has been involved with the history of American foodways since 1971 when she began the fireplace cooking program at Mystic Seaport Museum.

She is a frequent lecturer/panelist/consultant at museums such as Historic Deerfield, Strawbery Banke, and Penobscot Marine Museum.

She is the author of the highly regarded Saltwater Foodways which received the 1996 Jane Grigson Award for Scholarship in the Julia Child Cookbook Awards.

Selected Bibliography

  • Saltwater foodways : New Englanders and their food, at sea and ashore, in the nineteenth century (c1995)
  • Food in Colonial and Federal America (2005)
  • Giving Thanks: Thanksgiving Recipes and History from Pilgrims to Pumpkin Pie (2005)

McMillan, Bruce (1947 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Massachusetts-born author Bruce McMillan was raised in Bangor and Kennebunk, graduating from Kennebunk High School, and now lives in Shapleigh.

He has written, illustrated and photographed over 40 childrens books.

He received a biology degree from the University of Maine and his interest in biology is obvious in his books' topics and contents.

McMillan's Night of the Pufflings was named Hungry Mind Review's 1996 Book of Distinction.

McMillan frequently teaches a course called Writing, Illustrating and Publishing Childrens Picture Books at the University of New Hampshire.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Alphabet Symphony, (1977)
  • Punography, (1978)
  • The Remarkable Riderless Runaway Tricycle, (1978/1985)
  • Finest Kind O'Day: Lobstering in Maine, (1977/1984)
  • Apples, How They Grow, (1979)
  • Making Sneakers, (1980)
  • Punography Too, (1980)
  • Puniddles, (1982/1999)
  • Ghost Doll, (1983)
  • Here a Chick, There a Chick, (1983)
  • Kitten Can --, (1984)
  • Becca Backward, Becca Frontward: A Book of Concept Pairs, (1986)
  • Play Day: A Book of Terse Verse, (1991)
  • The Weather Sky, (1991/1999)
  • Beach Ball -- Left, Right, (1992)
  • Penguins at Home: Gentoos of Antarctica, (1993)
  • Sense Suspense: A Guessing Game for the Five Senses, (1994)
  • Night of the Pufflings, (1995/1999)
  • Salmon Summer, (1998)
  • Gletta the Foal, (1998)
  • Puffins Climb, Penguins Rhyme, (2001)
  • Days of the Ducklings, (2001)
  • Going Fishing, (2005)
  • The Problem with Chickens, (2005)
  • How the Ladies Stopped the Wind, (2007)

Selected Links

Osier, Nina (1952 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Romance Novel, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Short Stories

Nina Osier (AKA Marianne Barron), was born in Camden, Maine. Her first home was on Friendship Long Island off the Maine coast; she now lives in Sydney.

She graduated from New Hampshire College and worked as a high school teacher and as an accountant before becoming Director of the Division of Records Management at the Maine State Archives.

Osier has authored a number of science fiction books, e-books, novellas, and stories, as well as a romantic saga, a biography and a book of pet stories.

Selected Bibliography

  • Exile's End (1998)
  • Tabitha June Is a Shoulder Cat (2000)
  • Rough Rider (2000) (e-book), nominated for 2000 Frankfort eBook Award
  • The Mad Fisherman's Daughter: Two Novellas (2001)
  • Second Chances (2001)
  • Starship Castaways (2001)
  • Matushka (2001)
  • Sagarmatha (2001)
  • Silent Service (2001)
  • Regs (2001)
  • Interphase (2001)
  • Conduct Unbecoming (2001)
  • Unfamiliar Territory (2001)
  • Granite Island (2001)
  • Mistworld: The Matushka's Story Continues (2002)
  • The Way to Freedom (2002)
  • Love, Jimmy: A Maine Veteran's Longest Battle (2003)
  • Farthinghome, Book One: Invasion (2004)
  • Farthinghome, Book Two: Exodus (2004)
  • Farthinghome, Book Three: Atonement (2004)

Paine, Lincoln ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Before moving to Portland in the mid 1990s, maritime historian Lincoln Paine was employed in the publishing industry in New York. He was a senior editor at Facts on File and was editor of Sea History magazine.

A graduate of Philips Exeter Academy and Columbia University, in 2000 he was Portland's OpSail education committee co-chairman and wrote the sailing celebration's book, Down East: A Maritime History of Maine.

Paine's research and writing are widely recognized and he has presented papers as far away as Australia.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ships of the World: An Historical Encyclopedia (1997)
  • Ships of Discovery and Exploration (2000)
  • Warships of the World to 1900 (2000)

Palmer, Mary ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Poetry

Poet and children's book writer Mary Palmer is a native of West Baldwin, grew up in Buxton, and now lives in South Paris, Maine. She received a B.S. from the Gorham State Teachers College, taught for 35 years, and is a past president of both the Poetry Fellowship of Maine and the Maine Poets' Society.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mother Moose Rhymes (1986)
  • More Mother Moose Rhymes (1987)
  • As Clean As A Whistle (1990)
  • Sharing Secrets (1991)
  • The Complete Mother Moose (1997)
  • Poems Downeast (1994)
  • Kid Sisters Never Forget: Remember the Great Depression (2003)

Parton, Sara (1811 - 1872)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction

Sara Willis Parton was born Grata Payson Willis in Portland in 1811, the sister of Nathaniel Willis; she changed her first name to Sara early in her life. Their father, also Nathaniel Willis, founded Youth's Companion in 1827.

Parton was educated in Boston and then worked for her father's magazine until her marriage to Charles H. Eldredge in 1837; he died in 1846.

She then married Samuel P. Farrington in 1849, divorcing him in 1852.

By this time, she was contributing articles to periodicals under the pseudonym "Fanny Fern." In 1853, a collection of her pieces was published as Fern Leaves from Fanny's Port-Foliio; this sold 80,000 copies.

In 1855 Willis began to write a weekly column for the New York Ledger, for $100 per column; she was one of the first women columnists, and she continued this association until she died, commenting on daily affairs with satire and wit. In 1856, she married James Parton, a biographer, and the couple lived in New York City.

Selected Bibliography

  • Fern Leaves from Fanny's Portfolio (1853)
  • Fern Leaves from Fanny's Portfolio - Second Series (1854)
  • Little Ferns for Fanny's Little Friends (1854)
  • Ruth Hall: A Domestic Tale of the Present Times (1855)
  • Rose Clark (1856)
  • The Play-Day Book: New Stories for Little Folks (1857)
  • Fresh Leaves (1857)
  • A New Story Book for Children (1864)
  • Folly As It Flies, Hit At By Fanny Fern (1868)
  • Ginger-Snaps (1870)
  • Caper-Sauce: A Volume of Chit-Chat About Men, Women, and Things (1872)

Selected Resources

  • Famous American Women: A Biographical Dictionary from Colonial Times to the Present (ed. Robert McHenry, 1983)

Pattangall, William (1865 - 1942)

Genre: Non-Fiction

William Pattangall, born in Pembroke, Maine, was a newspaper editor, writer, lawyer, and judge.

An 1884 University of Maine graduate, he studied law for a short period after college and then spent time working in shoe factories and aboard ships. He returned to his studies and was admitted to the bar in 1893. He established a law practice in Machias and was elected to the Maine House of Representatives in 1897 and 1901.

After moving to Waterville, he was again elected to the House in 1909 and 1911. During his second term representing Waterville, he was appointed Attorney General and reappointed in 1912, 1915, and 1916. In 1926 he was appointed to the Maine Superior Court and selected as the Chief Justice in 1931. He retired in 1934.

In addition to his political career, Pattangall is noted as a political satirist whose caustic comments were greatly feared by the many Maine politicians he lampooned. Using the penname Stephen A. Douglas Smith, Pattangall published a series of biting letters, called the Meddybemps Letters in the Machias Union newspaper, of which he was the editor from 1903 to 1909. A second series, Maine Hall of Fame which consisted of short biographies of the state's leading politicians, was published in the Waterville Sentinel in 1909 and 1910 (and in book form in 1916); he also was the editor of the Sentinel.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine's Hall of Fame: Brief Biographies of the Great Men of Our State (1916)
  • The Meddybemps Letters: Reproduced from the Machias Union of 1903-1904 (1924)

Selected Resources

Pelletier, Cathie (1953 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Now living mostly in Lawrenceburg, TN, this Allagash native hasn't lived in Maine year-round in over 20 years, although she has taught writing at University of Maine-Farmington and she received her B.A. from the University of Maine.

Pelletier is the author of bleak yet funny novels that are usually set in northern Maine. She also writes under the pen name of K. C. McKinnon.

She is also the founder of Nashville Books, a small publishing company in her adopted hometown of Brentwood TN (where she lived until 2002); Nashville Books publishes non-fiction books about country music and country music stars.

Selected Bibliography

Books by Cathie Pelletier

  • The Funeral Makers (1986)
  • Once Upon A Time Upon the Banks (1989)
  • The Weight of Winter (1991)
  • The Bubble Reputation (1993)
  • A Marriage Made at Woodstock (1994)
  • Beaming Sonny Home (1996)
  • The Christmas Note (1997)
  • Running the Bulls (2005)
  • Christmas in Allagash: The Early Years (2009)
  • "A" Is For Allagash: A Lumberjack's Life (2010) with Louis Pelletier
  • The One-Way Bridge: A Novel (2013)

Books by K. C. McKinnon

  • Dancing at the Harvest Moon (1997)
  • Candles on Bay Street (1999)

McNair, Wesley (1941 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Wes McNair is a poet and professor emeritus and writer-in-residence at University of Maine-Farmington. He was born in Newport, NH, grew up in rural parts of New Hampshire and Vermont, and has lived in Mercer, Maine, since 1987.

He received a B.A. degree in English from Keene State College (1963), an M.A. degree in English from the Bread Loaf School of English at Middlebury College (1968), and an M.Lit. in American Literature from Bread Loaf (1975). He was previously a visiting professor of creative writing at Colby College in Waterville, Maine and professor of English at Colby-Sawyer College (NH) from 1968 to 1987, where he founded their American Studies program. He received an honorary degree from Colby-Sawyer in 2002.

McNair received the Sarah Josepha Hale Award, given to a distinguished writer connected with New England, in 1997. He's also received Rockefeller, Fulbright, and Guggenheim grants. Poems from Talking in the Dark have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and some are included in the 1999 edition of The Best American Poetry. Other honors include an Emmy Award, the Devins Award, and poetry prizes from several magazines. He has twice served on the nominating jury for the Pulitzer Prize in poetry. McNair was named Maine's Poet Laureate by Governor Paul LePage in March 2011.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Faces of Americans in 1853, (1983)
  • The Town of No, (1989/1997)
  • Twelve Journeys in Maine, (1992)
  • My Brother Running, (1993/1997)
  • The Dissonant Heart, (1995)
  • Talking in the Dark, (1998) - Fire, (2002)
  • Mapping the Heart: Reflections on Place and Poetry, (June 2002)
  • The Ghosts of You and Me, (2006)
  • Lovers Of The Lost: New & Selected Poems (2010)
  • The Words I Chose: A Memoir of Family and Poetry (2012)
  • The Lost Child: Ozark Poems (2014)
  • The Unfastening: Poems (2017)
  • Dwellers in the House of the Lord (2020)

Selected Links

Perkins, Virginia (1902 - 1987)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Born and raised in Blue Hill, the younger sister of Mary Ellen Chase, Virginia Chase Perkins graduated from the University of Minnesota and got her MA from Wayne State University. She and her husband lived for a while in Connecticut, where she taught at Hartford College.

In 1940, Perkins won the Avery Hopwood Award for fiction.

Selected Bibliography

  • The American House (1944)
  • Discovery (1948)
  • The End of the Week (1953)
  • One Crow, Two Crows (1971)
  • The Writing of Modern Prose (1936)
  • The Knight of the Golden Fleece (1959)
  • Speaking of Maine: Selections from the Writings of Virginia Chase (1983)

Mead, Alice (1952 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Young Adult

Alice Mead, a writer of realistic books for children and young adults, was born in New York and has lived in Maine for over 20 years, now in Portland with her husband and two sons.

She received her B.A. in English from Bryn Mawr College, an M.A. in elementary education from Univ. of Southern California, and a B.A. in art education from Univ. of Southern Maine.

She has taught art and flute in Maine schools and founded a preschool. She's also founded her own press, Loose Cannon Press, in Cumberland, which has published a couple of her books.

Selected Bibliography:

  • Crossing the Starlight Bridge, (1994)
  • Walking the Edge, (1995)
  • Journey to Kosova, (1995)
  • Junebug, (1995)
  • Giants of the Dawnland, (1996)
  • Adem's Cross, (1996)
  • Junebug and the Reverend, (1998)
  • Soldier Mom, (1999)
  • Billy & Emma, (2000)
  • Girl of Kosovo, (2001)
  • Junebug in Trouble, (2002)
  • Year of No Rain, (2003)
  • Madame Squidley and Beanie, (2004)
  • Swimming to America, (2005)
  • Isabella's Above-Ground Pool, (2006)
  • Dawn and Dusk, (2007)
  • Nowish: A Life Out of Time, (2009)

Selected Links

Phippen, Sanford (1942 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Sandy Phippen grew up in Hancock Point, graduated from the University of Maine in 1964, received a Master's degree from Syracuse University, and taught English in the public schools of central New York for fifteen years before returning to Maine. Phippen has taught English at Orono High School and is an essayist and a writer of fiction.

Selected Bibliography

  • A History of The Town of Hancock (1978)
  • Cheap Gossip: The Letters from Liverpool (1989)
  • The Police Know Everything (1982)
  • People Trying to be Good (1996)
  • The Messiah in the Memorial Gym and Other Writings 1973-1998 (1998)
  • Standing Just Outside the Door (2002)
  • The Best Maine Stories: The Marvelous Mystery (1986 editor, with Charles Waugh and Martin Harry Greenberg)
  • High Clouds Soaring, Storms Driving Low: The Letters of Ruth Moore (1993)

Millay, Edna St. Vincent (1892 - 1950)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Millay was born in Rockland, spent much of her childhood in Camden, graduated from Vassar, and won the 1923 Pulitzer Prize in poetry for The Harp Weaver and Other Poems. One of her most famous poems, Renascence, is said to have been inspired by the view from the top of Camden's Mt. Battie. Although Millay rarely returned to Camden after college, she and her husband often summered on Ragged Island in Casco Bay.

Selected Bibliography

  • Renascence, and Other Poems, (1917)
  • Second April, (1921)
  • The Ballad of the Harp-Weaver, (1922)
  • A Few Figs from Thistles: Poems & Sonnets, (1922)
  • Edna St. Vincent Millay's Poems: Selected For Young People, (1929)
  • Fatal Interview: Sonnets, (1931)
  • Wine From These Grapes, (1934)
  • Conversation at Midnight, (1937)
  • Mine the Harvest, (1954)
  • Take Up the Song, (1986)
  • Edna St. Vincent Millay: Selected Poems, (1991)
  • Selected Poems, (2003)

Selected References

Selected Links

Miller, Steve (1950 - )

Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy

Miller and his wife Sharon Lee live in Winslow, Maine and are the co-authors of the Liaden Universe books, romantic space operas.

Miller was born in Baltimore, attended Univ. of Maryland, Baltimore County, and has had many careers, as music and book reviewer, reporter, editor, chess tournament director, librarian, sysop, resource specialist for a statewide electronic bulletin board system, and, after he and his wife moved to Maine, a stint as night shift employee of a Cumberland Farms convenience store.

Selected Bibliography

Liaden Universe

  • Agent of Change, (1988)
  • Conflict of Honors, (1988)
  • Carpe Diem, (1989)
  • Plan B, (2002)
  • Local Custom, (2002)
  • Scout's Progress, (2002)
  • I Dare, (2002)
  • Crystal Soldier (2005
  • Crystal Dragon (2006)
  • Balance of Trade, (2004) (winner of the Hal Clement Award for Best Young Adult Science Fiction Novel of 2004)

Gem ser Edreth adventures series,

  • The Tomorrow Log, (2003)

Selected Links

Moore, Elizabeth (1947 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Moore, a Pownal resident, was born in Norwood, Massachusetts and is a 1970 graduate of the University of Massachusetts in Boston with a degree in English. She moved to Maine in 1974.

She has worked in a number of social service settings such as a mental health program, manager of a group home, and as a classroom aide working with emotionally disturbed children.

Moore's short fiction has been published in The Bridge, Breadloaf Quarterly, Crescent Review, Naked Man, and New England Review. Her fiction, essays, and reviews have appeared in Maine publications such as Portland Review of Arts, Portland Magazine, and the Casco Bay Weekly.

Selected Bibliography

  • Cold Times, (1992)

Moore, James (1935 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

James Moore was born in Philadelphia, moved to Fort Kent at age 12, graduated from the University of Maine (Orono) in 1956, and lives in Brunswick with his wife and three children.

After serving with the U.S. Army in Korea, he joined the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) in 1960, working there for 25 years. Moore also worked for a couple of years with INTERPOL, handling international murder, rape, and robbery investigations. He retired in Portland as the ATF agent in charge for Maine and New Hampshire.

His fiction is based on experiences gained from the various departments of law enforcement in which he has served.

He wrote the controversial book Human Sacrifice in which he questions the conviction of Dennis Dechaine in the Sarah Cherry murder case.

Selected Bibliography

  • Official Secrets, (1996)
  • Very Special Agents, (1997)
  • Human Sacrifice, (2002)

Moore, Ruth (1903 - 1989)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Poetry

Moore was born on Gotts Island, Maine and graduated from what is now the New York State University at Albany with a degree in English.

After acquiring her degree, she worked for a time as the secretary for NAACP founder Mary White Ovington and as an editor at Reader's Digest. While living in Greenwhich Village, NY, she wrote poetry and several unpublished novels.

Her second novel, was made into the film Deep Waters, the proceeds of which allowed her to return to Maine where she remained until her death in 1989.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Weir: A Novel of the Maine Coast,(1943)
  • Spoonhandle, (1946)
  • The Fire Balloon, (1948)
  • Candlemas Bay, (1950)
  • Jeb Ellis of Candlemas Bay, (1952)
  • A Fair Wind Home, (1953)
  • Speak to the Winds, (1956);
  • Cold As A Dog and the Wind Northeast: Ballads, (1958)
  • The Walk Down Main Street, (1960)
  • Second Growth, (1962)
  • The Sea Flower, (1964)
  • The Gold & Silver Hooks, (1969)
  • Time's Web: Poems (1972)
  • Lizzie & Caroline, a novel, (1972)
  • The Dinosaur Bite, (1976)
  • Sarah Walked Over the Mountain, (1979)
  • The Tired Apple Tree: Poems & Ballads, (1990)
  • High Clouds Soaring, Storms Driving Low: The Letters of Ruth Moore, (1993)

Selected Links

Plourde, Lynn (1955 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Plourde, a native of Dexter and now a Winthrop resident, has always lived in Maine. She earned a B.A. and M.A. from the University of Maine. A school speech therapist for twenty years, her first publishing efforts included educational texts and a series of program and activity books written for the classroom teacher.

Plourde has said that she was first aware of picture books when she became the stepmother of three-year-old and four-year-old boys. Thoroughly taken with the joys of good picture books, she began writing her own stories. She persevered through thirteen years of rejection slips before her first picture book, Pigs in the Mud in the Middle of the Rud (1997), was accepted and published.

Plourde, one of the Maine Arts Commission's visiting artists, has received enthusiastic responses to her program presented in Maine schools and libraries.

Maine writer Jack Barnes included Plourde's books in his 1998 annual review of the best in that year's Maine children's books. The positive response to her books, however, extends far beyond the state of Maine. Pigs in the Mud in the Middle of the Rud is found on a number of national and regional Best Books lists such as the Chicago Public Library's "1997 Best of the Best;" and a Garrison, New York school/library bibliography. Wild Child was a 1999 American Booksellers Association's "Children's Pick of the List."

In addition to writing picture books, Plourde, with her husband, Paul Knowles, wrote A Celebration of Maine's Children's Books (1998). It focuses on what they consider the best 185 Maine children's books in print and contains plot summaries, biographical information, and learning activities for each title.

Selected Bibliography

  • Winter Waits (2000)
  • Snow Day (2001)
  • Spring's Sprung (2002)
  • School Picture Day (2002)
  • Grandpappy Snippy Snappies (2002)
  • Summer's Vacation (2003)
  • Teacher Appreciation Day (2003)
  • Thank You, Grandpa (2003)
  • The First Feud: Between the Mountain and the Sea (2003)
  • Mother, May I? (2004)
  • Pajama Day (2005)
  • Dad, Aren't You Glad? (2005)
  • Book Fair Day (2006)
  • Dino Pets (2007)
  • A Mountain of Mittens (2007)
  • At One - In a Place Called Maine (2007)
  • Margaret Chase Smith: A Woman for President (2008)
  • Science Fair Day (2008)
  • The Dump Man's Treasures (2008)
  • Field Trip Day (2009)
  • Dino Pets Got to School (2011)
  • Lost Trail: Nine Days Alone in the Wilderness with Donn Fendler (2011)
  • Only Cows Allowed! (2011)
  • You're Wearing That to School?! (2013)
  • Merry Moosey Christmas (2014)
  • Bella's Fall Coat (2016)
  • Maxi's Secrets (Or What You Can Learn from a Dog) (2016)
  • Baby Bear's Not Hibernating (2017)
  • I Could Give You Christmas (2019)
  • The Boy Whose Face Froze Like That (2020)
  • Happy Birthday Maine! (2020)

Selected Links

Pike, Mary (1824 - 1908)

Genre: General Fiction

Mary Green Hayden Pike was born in Eastport, Maine, and went to school in Calais. In 1845 she married Frederick A. Pike, a lawyer from Calais. The Pikes lived in Calais most of their lives, except for eight years in Washington DC (1861-1869) when he was in Congress, and a few years in Europe after that. After her husband died in 1866, Pike moved to Plainfield, NJ. She died in Baltimore, MD in 1908.

She wrote using a couple of different pen names -- Mary Langdon and Sydney A. Story, Jr.

Pike was also a contributor to Atlantic Monthly, Harper's, and Graham's. Later in life, she became a landscape painter.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ida May; A Story of Things Actual and Possible (as Mary Langdon) (1854)
  • Caste: A Story of Republican Equality (as Sydney A. Story, Jr.) (1856)
  • Agnes (1858)

Morison, Betty (1924 - 2001)

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

BJ (Betty Jane) Morison was born in Kittery and lived in Bar Harbor. She was the author of five mystery novels in the Little Maine Murder Series which feature a precocious child named Elizabeth Lamb Worthington who vacations with her Boston grandmother on Mount Desert every summer. She also wrote a Christmas novel and an audio book.

Morison was the daughter-in-law of Rear Adm. Samuel Eliot Morison, U.S. Navy Res., who pops up in her novels as 'the General,' Lemuel Otis Alsion.

Selected Bibliography

Little Maine Murder Series

  • Champagne and a Garden, (1982)
  • Port and a Star Boarder, (1983)
  • Beer and Skittles, (1985)
  • The Voyage of the Chianti, (1987)
  • The Martini Effect, (1992)

Other works

  • Reality and Dream: A Christmas Story, (1985)

Pochocki, Ethel (1925 - 2010)

Genre: Children's Literature

Ethel Pochocki was born and raised in Bayonne, NJ. She lived in Brooks, Maine. She raised 8 children and has written over 30 children's books. Pochocki also wrote for Cricket and Church World.

She died Decmeber 1, 2010.

Selected Bibliography

As Ethel Marbach

  • Once Upon A Time Saints: Faith Tales for Children (1978)
  • Emily's Rainbow (1978)
  • The Cabbage Moth and the Shamrock (1978)
  • White Rabbit (1984)
  • Dandelions, Fireflies amd Rhubarb Pie: The Adventures of Grandma Bagley and Her Friends (1984)

As Ethel Pochocki

  • Grandma Bagley Leads the Way: Adventures with the Brooksville Bunch (1989)
  • Grandma Bagley to the Rescue: Adventures with the Brooksville Bunch (1989)
  • Saints of the Season for Children (1989)
  • Rosebud and Red Flannel (1989) (1991 Lupine Award)
  • The Fox Who Found Christmas (1990)
  • The Attic Mice (1990)
  • Adventures of Pilaf, Almondine, and Tetrazzini (1992)
  • Wildflower Tea (1993)
  • The Mushroom Man (1993)
  • The Gypsies' Tale (1994)
  • One-of-a-Kind Friends: Saints and Heroes for Kids (1994)
  • The Wild Harp and Other Angel Tales (1995)
  • A Penny for a Hundred: A Story of Friendship (1996) (1996 Smithsonian Notable Book for Children)
  • Soup Pot: Stories for All Seasons for Children of All Ages (1996)
  • More Once Upon A Time Saints (1998)
  • The Christmas Eve Storyteller (1999 with Edward Hays)
  • The Mistletoe Girl, and other Christmas stories (1999)
  • The Gazebo (2002)
  • A Writer's Garden (2002)
  • Maine Marmalade (2004)
  • The Women of Lockerbie (2005)
  • The Blessing of the Beasts (2007)

Selected Resources

Moss, Margaret (1966 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Freeport native Margaret Moss is the previous Assistant Director of and currently a consultant to the Center for the Prevention of Hate Violence located at the University of Southern Maine. She conducts workshops on hate violence for teachers and students at all levels of education. A former assistant attorney general in the Maine Department of Attorney General, she is a 1988 Princeton graduate and received her law degree from Washington College of Law, American University.

Selected bibliography

Porter, Bernard (1911 - 2004)

Genre: Illustrator, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Bern Porter was born in Maine and graduated from Colby College in 1932. He went on to get an M.S. from Brown University and worked as a physicist on cathrode ray tube technology before WWII; when the war came, Bern was drafted for uranium separation work on the Manhattan Project, a job he quit after the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima in Aug. 1945.

From 1944-1948 he and George Leite published the literary magazine Circle 10; Porter also published Henry Miller's anti-war tract, Murder the Murderers, the first U.S. publisher of Miller. He actively promoted and published other writers under Bern Porter Books publishing company, at the same time developing his own art, including poetry, found poetry (founds), sound poetry, performance art, experimental essays, surrealistic photographs, collages, mail art, architectural sketches, and found sculpture. Porter has also worked again as a physicist, on NASA's Saturn V manned space project, all the while working on an integration of science and art, formally developed in his Sciart Mainfesto (1950).

He's also the founder of the Institute for Advanced Thinking, a network of non-academic scholars in various arts.

Selected Bibliography

  • Being a Map of Physics... (designed by Porter, 1939),
  • Water-Fight (1941)
  • Henry Miller Miscellanea (1945)
  • Formula (1947)
  • Drawings, 1955-1956 (1957)
  • Physics for Tomorrow in Architecture, In Art, In Communication, In Literature, In Music, In Poetry (1959)
  • I've Left: A Manifesto and a Testament of SCIence and ART (SCIART) (1963)
  • What Henry Miller Said and Why It Is Important (1964)
  • Art Productions, 1928-1965 (1965)
  • The First Publications of F. Scott Fitzgerald (1965)
  • Mathematics for Electronics: A Self-Instructional Programmed Manual (1965)
  • H.L. Mencken: A Bibliography (1965)
  • Where to Go, What to Do, When in New York, Week of June 17, 1972 (1972)
  • Found Poems (1972)
  • Waste-Maker, 1926-1961 (1972)
  • The Manhattan Telephone Book 1972 (1975)
  • Run-On (1975)
  • Selected Sounds (1975)
  • Gee-Whizzels (1976)
  • The Book of Do's (1982)
  • Here Comes Everybody's Don't Book (1984)
  • Horizontal Hold (1985)
  • My My Dear Me (1985)
  • Sweet End (1989)
  • Less Than Overweight (1992)
  • Sounds That Arouse Me: Selected Writings (1993)
  • Questions About Henry Miller That No One Ever Asked Me -- With Answers (1995)
  • Symbols (1995)
  • These 50 Years Gone (1995)
  • Night Thoughts on Henry Miller, Ben Abramson and Claude Houghton... (1996)
  • A Sex Oriented, Woman Connected Guy Doing His Own Thing: Bern Porter on Henry Miller, A Manuscript (1996)

Illustrations and Photos

  • Poems Pennyeach (illustrations/ 1927; James Joyce)
  • The American Fantasies: Original End Papers and Page Illustrations (1959; for James Schevill's poems)
  • Die Fabelhafte Geträume Von Taifun Willi (decor/ 1970; by Dick Higgins)
  • Judgement [i.e. To Have Done With the Judgements [sic] of God]: A Radio Script (pen drawings/ 1971; by Antoine Artaud)
  • City with All the Angles: A Radio Play (photos/ 1974; by Dick Higgins).

Selected Resources

  • Bern! Porter! Interview! by Margaret Dunbar. Dog-Ear Press (1983)
  • Where to Go, What to Do, When You are Bern Porter by James Schevill. Tilbury House (1992)

Muir, Emily (1904 - 2003)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Artist, architect, writer Emily Lansingh Muir, who was a Stonington resident, was born in Chicago and studied at The Art Students League in New York. In 1938 she and her husband, artist William H. Muir (1903-1964), moved to Maine, a place familiar to Emily as she spent her childhood summers on Deer Isle.

Muir was the recipient of numerous national and international awards for her paintings and architecture. The University of Maine recognized her contributions to Maine's art culture and to the state's natural environment when it granted her the Maryann Hartman Award in 1994.

Selected Bibliography

  • Small Potatoes, (1940)
  • The Time of My Life, (2002)

Selected Resources

Ipcar, Dahlov (1917 - 2017)

Genre: Children's Literature, Young Adult

Dahlov Zorach Ipcar was born in Windsor, Vermont and summered in Maine as a child. She married Adolph Ipcar (1905 - 2003) when she was 18 and they moved to a Robinhood, Maine farm where she's lived since 1937.

Ipcar has written and illustrated over 80 children's and young adult books, many repeating her primary images of animals and farm life.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Little Fisherman (1944)
  • Animal Hide and Seek (1947)
  • One Horse Farm (1950)
  • World Full of Horses (1955)
  • The Wonderful Egg (1958)
  • Ten Big Farms (1958)
  • Brown Cow Farm: A Counting Book (1959)
  • I Like Animals (1960)
  • Deep Sea Farm (1961)
  • Stripes and Spots (1961)
  • Wild and Tame Animals (1962)
  • Lobsterman (1962)
  • Black and White (1963)
  • I Love My Anteater with an A (1964)
  • Calico Jungle (1965)
  • Horses of Long Ago (1965)
  • Bright Barnyard (1966)
  • General Felize (1967; ill. Kenneth Longtemps)
  • The Song of the Day Birds and the Night Birds (1967)
  • Whisperings and Other Things (1967)
  • The Wild Whirlwind (1968)
  • The Cat at Night (1969)
  • The Warlock of Night (1969)
  • The Marvelous Merry-Go-Round (1970)
  • Sir Addlepate and the Unicorn (1971)
  • The Cat Came Back (1971)
  • The Biggest Fish in the Sea (1972)
  • A Flood of Creatures (1973)
  • The Queen of Spells (1973)
  • The Land of Flowers (1974)
  • Bug City (1975)
  • Hard Scrabble Harvest (1976)
  • A Dark Horn Blowing (1978)
  • Lost and Found: A Hidden Animal Book (1981)
  • My Wonderful Christmas Tree (1986)
  • The Nightmare and Her Foal and other stories (1990)
  • Dahlov Ipcar's Farmyard Alphabet (2010)
  • Bring in the Pumpkins (date unknown)
  • Stripes and Spots (2012)
  • Dahlov Ipcar's Maine alphabet (2012)

Selected Resources

Pryor, Kelli (1964 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Romance Novel

Kelli Pryor is a celebrity journalist who has worked for Picture Week magazine, New York magazine and Entertainment Weekly (1989-1993).

Raised in the Ozarks, in Carterville, MO, and a graduate of the University of Missouri, Pryor has lived since 1993 on Lake Arrowhead in Limerick, Maine, with her husband, Andrew Rosenstein, also a writer. Besides two works of non-fiction she's co-authored, Pryor has also written three romances under the pseudonym Annie Garrett.

Selected Bibliography

Non-Fiction

  • No Words to Say Goodbye (1994, with Raimonda Kopelnitsky)
  • For Real: The Uncensored Truth About America's Teenagers (1995, with Jane Pratt, former editor of Sassy magazine)

As Annie Garrett

  • Angel Falling Too Close to the Ground (1995)
  • Because I Wanted You (1997)
  • After You (1998)

Ipcar, Robert ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Young Adult

Robert Ipcar -- photographer, former columnist and contributing editor for Film Crew Magazine, and science fiction author -- is a Maine native living in Park Slope, Brooklyn, NY, with his family. His mother is Maine artist Dahlov Ipcar.

In the 1970s he was photographer for a children's book series called What Can She Be (text by Gloria and Esther Goldreich), depicting working women in what were then considered unconventional careers. He has also written a science fiction trilogy called the Children of Orion.

Selected Bibliography

What Can She Be? series

  • What Can She Be? A Veterinarian (1972)
  • What Can She Be? A Lawyer (1973)
  • What Can She Be? A Newscaster (1973)
  • What Can She Be? An Architect (1974)
  • What Can She Be? A Musician (1975)
  • What Can She Be? A Police Officer (1975)
  • What Can She Be? A Farmer (1976)
  • What Can She Be? A Geologist (1976)
  • What Can She Be? A Film Producer (1977)
  • What Can She Be? A Legislator (1978)
  • What Can She Be? A Computer Scientist (1979)

Children of Orion Trilogy

  • Children of Orion (2001)
  • The Timeweaver (?)
  • Return To Ash'elon (?)

Isaacson, Judith (1925 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Judith Magyar Isaacson was born in Hungary. In 1944 she, her mother, aunt, and grandmother were deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau where her grandmother died. Judith, her mother and aunt were sent to another concentration camp, Hessich-Lichtenau. In 1945 they were taken to Tekla where the US Army liberated them. Judith married Irving Isaacson, an American Army officer, and moved with him to Lewiston, Maine, Irving's hometown.

In 1965 Judith graduated from Bates College with a major in mathematics. She taught math at Lewiston High School for three years and then studied at Bowdoin College where she earned a Master's degree in 1969. That same year she was hired as Dean of Women at Bates College. She was Dean of Students from 1975 to 1977 when she retired. She received an honorary doctorate from Bowdoin in 1994.

A 1976 invitation from Bowdoin College to speak about her survival in the camps was a turning point in her life. The day after her presentation, she began to write the her memoirs. Her book has been translated into several languages, was the inspiration for Mark Polishook's electronic chamber opera, and is the subject of a short video.

Her manuscripts for the book plus family papers can be viewed at Bates College Ladd Library. Other Isaacson papers can be found in the Maine Women Writers Collection, University of New England.

Selected Bibliography

  • Seed of Sarah: Memoirs of a Survivor in 1990

Selected Links

Jacobson, Jennifer (1958 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Young Adult

Jennifer Jacobson lives in Cumberland with her husband and two children. She received an M.Ed. from Harvard and has taught elementary school, acted as a curriculum coordinator, admissions director, and language arts specialist in several New England schools.

Besides writing children's picture books and an educational non-fiction series, Jacobson also works as an online columnist and as an educational consultant, speaking at teachers' conferences.

She is available for author visits in elementary schools.

Selected Bibliography

Children's Books

  • A Net of Stars (1997)
  • Moon Sandwich Mom (1999)
  • Winnie Dancing on Her Own (2001)
  • Truly Winnie (2003)
  • Andy Shane and the Very Bossy Dolores Starbuckle (2005)

Young Adult Books

  • Stained (2005)
  • Stones From the Muse: Runes for the Creative Journey with Emily Herman (1997)

Books on Elementary Education (all written with Dottie Raymer)

  • (1998/1999)
  • How is My Second Grader Doing in School? What To Expect and How to Help (1998/1999)
  • How is My Third Grader Doing in School? What To Expect and How to Help (1999)
  • How is My Fourth Grader Doing in School? What To Expect and How to Help (2000)
  • How is My Fifth Grader Doing in School? What To Expect and How to Help (2000)
  • How is My Sixth Grader Doing in School? What To Expect and How to Help (2000)

Selected Links

Jahn-Clough, Lisa (1967 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Lisa Jahn-Clough, a children's picture book author and illustrator, spent the first ten years of her life on a farm in Rhode Island (except for two years living Norway), but summered on Monhegan Island, Maine. Her family moved to coastal Maine when she was 10; she grew up in Brunswick, later lived in the Boston area, and lives in Portland, Maine.

Formerly the director of Children's Writing Certificate Program at Emerson College in Boston, where she taught for several years, Jahn-Clough is a member of the faculty in MFA Writing for Children and Young Adults at Hamline University. She also leads workshops for elementary school children on book-making and for adults on writing, illustrating and publishing children's books.

Her B.A. is from Hampshire College (1984), her M.F.A. in creative writing from Emerson College (1993).

Selected Bibliography

  • Alicia and Her Happy Way of Life (1991)
  • Alicia's Evil Side (1992)
  • Alicia Has a Bad Day (1994)
  • My Happy Birthday Book (1996)
  • ABC Yummy (1997)
  • 123 Yipee (1998)
  • My Friend and I (1999)
  • Missing Molly (2000)
  • Simon and Molly Plus Hester (2001)
  • A Big Bed for Jed written by Laurie Friedman and illustrated by Jahn-Clough (2002)
  • We're Painting written by Carol Snyder and illustrated by Jahn-Clough (2002)
  • Alicia's Best Friends (2003)
  • On the Hill (2004)
  • Country girl, City Girl (2004)
  • Little Dog (2006)

Selected Links

James, Howard (1935 - 2018)

Genre: Non-Fiction

A Maine resident since 1976, Howard James was born in Iowa City, IA. He attended schools in Moline, IL, and Elkhart, IN, and was freshman and sophomore class president at Michigan State University, working during college full-time for TV and radio stations in Lansing and Grand Rapids, and graduating in 1958 with degrees in communication (radio-tv) and journalism. In 1971, Michigan State recognized his work with an honorary doctorate.

James established the first full-time radio-tv news bureau at the Michigan state capitol. Soon he switched to newspapers, moving to the Marquette Mining Journal in Michigan's Upper Peninsula.

In 1960 he became a reporter for the Chicago Tribune and in 1964 was named Midwest bureau chief of the Christian Science Monitor.

While he was working for the Christian Science Monitor, James was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting (1968) for his series of articles, "Crisis in the Courts," about incompetence and corruption in the American judiciary system, which was published the same year in book form under the same title.

The following year he produced a second award-winning major Monitor series, reporting a nationwide study of programs for delinquent youth, published in 1970 as Children in Trouble: A National Scandal.

His third book, The Little Victims: How America Treats its Children, was published in 1975.

James moved to Maine in 1976 after marrying Judy Munro, publisher of the Berlin (NH) Reporter. He lives in Norway and until June 2005 owned the Rumford Falls Times and the Norway Advertiser-Democrat. He sold those papers to the Lewiston Sun Journal to devote more time to writing books.

Bibliography

  • Crisis in the Courts (1968)
  • Children in Trouble: A National Scandal (1970)
  • The Little Victims: How America Treats its Children (1975)

Pullen, John (1913 - 2003)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Pullen, born in Amity, Maine, graduated from Colby College and from Ricker Classical Institute in 1935. He served as an Army captain during World War II and worked as a newspaper reporter in Maine and as an advertising vice president in Philadelphia, PA before retiring in 1965 to devote himself to writing.

He was one of Maine's most highly respected Civil War historians. His Twentieth Maine: A Volunteer Regiment in the Civil War is a masterful combination of scholarship and dramatic narrative. First published in 1957 and re-issued numerous times, it tells the story of the Twentieth Maine, commanded by Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, and its decisive role in the Battle of Little Round Top at Gettysburg. The book is included in Scarborough Public Library's The Mirror of Maine: One Hundred Distinguished Books That Reveal the History of the State and the Life of its People as it "has influenced the nation's views of Maine's contribution to the war."

He died at home in Brunswick, Maine, on 25 Feb. 2003.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Shower of Stars: The Medal of Honor and the 27th Maine (1966)
  • Joshua Chamberlain: A Hero's Life and Legacy (1999)
  • Patriotism in America: A Study of Changing Devotions, 1770-1970 (1971)
  • The Transcendental Boiled Dinner (1972)
  • Comic Relief: The Life and Laughter of Artemus Ward, 1834-1867 (1983).

Selected Links

Jane, Mary Childs (1909 - 1991)

Genre: Children's Literature, Young Adult

Children's mystery writer Mary Childs Jane was born in Needham, Massachusetts, and graduated from Bridgewater State Teachers College in Massachusetts in 1931.

Before her marriage to William Jane in 1937, she taught in Pippapon, Kentucky (1931-1932), Chester, Massachusetts (1932-1935), and Needham, Massachusetts (1935-1937). She was a long-time resident of Newcastle, Maine.

Jane was for several years president of the Poetry Fellowship of Maine.

Jane's specialty was writing mysteries for middle school age children. She knew, from her teaching experience, that many reluctant readers can be lead to reading with mysteries.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mystery in Old Quebec (1955)
  • The Ghost Rock Mystery (1956)
  • Mystery at Pemaquid Point (1957)
  • Mystery at Shadow Pond (1958), set in Maine.
  • Mystery on Echo Ridge (1959)
  • Mystery Back of the Mountain (1960)
  • Mystery at Dead End Farm (1961)
  • Mystery Behind Dark Windows (1962)
  • Mystery by Moonlight (1963)
  • Mystery in Longfellow Square (1964)
  • Indian Island Mystery (1965)
  • The Dark Tower Mystery (1966)
  • Mystery on Nine-Mile Marsh (1967)
  • Mystery of the Red Carnations (1968)
  • The Rocking-Chair Ghost (1969)
  • Mystery in Hidden Hollow (1970)

Selected Resources

Sargent, Colin (1954 - )

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction, Poetry

Poet Colin Sargent is a native of Portland, Maine and is founding editor and publisher of award-winning . He has published fiction, a play and books of poetry.

A graduated of the U.S. Naval Academy, Sargent won the Academy of American Poets University and College Poetry Prize in 1976 while a midshipman. In 1981 he became the youngest Navy officer to edit Approach Magazine, the Navy and Marine Corps aviation safety magazine. He earned his MFA degree in creative writing from the University of Southern Maine's Stonecoast program. He has won the 2002 Acorn School for the Performing Art's Maine Playwrights Contest and, in 2003, he received the Individual Artist Fellowship grant for poetry awarded by the Maine Arts Commission.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry

  • Luftwaffe Snowshoes (1984)
  • Blush (1987)
  • Undertow (1994).

Drama

  • One Hundred Percent American Girl,

Fiction

  • Museum of Human Beings (2008) about Jean Baptiste Charbonneau, Sacagawea's son

Selected Resources

Sargent, Ruth (1920 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Ruth Sargent, a resident of Peaks Island in Casco Bay, began her career as a photo-journalist for the Portland newspapers. She has written more than 125 magazine and newspaper articles and has had 10 books published for both children and adults.

Selected Bibliography

Books for children include:

  • Abbie Burgess: Lighthouse Heroine (1969/1987/1992; with Dorothy Holden Jones)
  • The Littlest Lighthouse (1981; illus. Marion C. Litchfield)
  • The Nautical Alphabet (1984)
  • Always Nine Years Old; Sarah Orne Jewett's Childhood (1985)
  • The Island Merry-Go-Round (1988; illus. Pam DeVito)
  • Five Girls Aboard the Mayflower's Voyage to Freedom (1989)
  • The Tunnel Beneath the Sea (1993; illus. Peter Gorski and Pam DeVito)

Books for adults include:

  • Island Living is Great (1976; a collection of 36 published articles)
  • Gail Laughlin, ERA Advocate (1979)
  • How To Do A "Who Dun It?" (1991)
  • The Casco Bay Islands (compiler, 1995)

Janeczko, Paul (1945 - 2019)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Paul Janeczko, was born in Passaic, NJ, graduated from St. Francis College in Biddeford (A.B., 1967) and John Carroll University (M.A. 1970) and is a resident of Hebron, Maine. Janeczko has taught for many years, including in Cleveland in the late 1960s and at Gray-New Gloucester High School from 1977-1990. He has also interviewed a number of writers, including children's writer M.E. Kerr (1975) and Maine's own Stephen King (1980).

Janeczko himself was interviewed for The ALAN Review in Spring 1997; he talked about teaching poetry and developing anthologies. He runs poetry workshops internationally, speaks at schools and libraries, and continues to turn out poetry anthologies designed primarily for kids and teens.

Janeczko also wrote Young Indiana Jones and the Pirates' Loot under the pen name J.N. Fox (paying homage to baseballer Jacob Nelson Fox).

Selected Bibliography

Anthologies

  • The Crystal Image (1977)
  • Postcard Poems: A Collection of Poetry for Sharing (1979)
  • Don't Forget to Fly: A Cycle of Modern Poems (1981)
  • Poetspeak: In Their Work, About Their Work (1983) an ALA Best Book for Young Adults
  • Strings: A Gathering of Family Poems (1984)
  • Pocket Poems: Selected for a Journey (1985)
  • Going Over To Your Place: Poems for Each Other (1987)
  • This Delicious Day: 65 Poems (1987)
  • The Music of What Happens: Poems That Tell
  • The Place My Words Are Looking For: What Poets Say About and Through Their Work (1990) an ALA Notable Book
  • Preposterous: Poems of Youth (1991)
  • Looking For Your Name: A Collection of Contemporary Poems (1993)
  • Poetry from A to Z: A Guide to Young Writers (1994)
  • Wherever Home Begins: Ten Contemporary Poems (1995)
  • I Feel A Little Jumpy Around You: Paired Poems by Men and Women (1996) with Naomi Shihab Nye
  • Home on the Range: Cowboy Poetry (1997)
  • Very Best (Almost) Friends: Poems of Friendship (1998) with Christine Davenier
  • Stone Bench in an Empty Park (2000)
  • Dirty Laundry Pile: Poems in Different Voices (2000) illustrated by Maine illustrator Melissa Sweet
  • A Poke in the I (2001)
  • Blushing: Expressions Of Love In Poems And Letters (2004)
  • A Kick in the Head: An Everyday Guide to Poetic Forms (2005)

Teaching Books

  • Favorite Poetry Lessons (1998)
  • How To Write Poetry (1999)
  • Seeing the Blue Between: Advice and Inspiration for Young Poets (2002)
  • Good for a Laugh: A Guide to Writing Amusing, Clever, and Downright Funny Poems (2003)
  • How to Write Haiku and Other Short Poems (2004)

Janeczko's own books of poetry, fiction, and non-fiction

  • Loads of Codes and Secret Ciphers (1981)
  • Bridges to Cross (1986; YA fiction)
  • Brickyard Summer (1989; poetry) won the first Lupine Award)
  • Stardust Hotel (1993; poetry), sometimes listed as Stardust Otel)
  • That Sweet Diamond: Baseball Poems (1998)
  • Worlds Afire (2004; YA)
  • Top Secret: A Handbook of Codes, Ciphers and Secret Writing (2006)
  • The dark game : true spy stories (2010) Finalist Young Adult Library Services Association Award for Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults

Selected Links

Sarton, May (1912 - 1995)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Sarton, born Eleanor Marie Sarton on May 3, 1912 in Wondelgem, Belgium, emigrated to the U.S. with her family in 1916, settling in Massachusetts. Sarton lived in New Hampshire as an adult, moving to York, Maine in 1973, where she lived for 22 years until her death on July 16, 1995. Sarton was a prolific author with novels, memoirs, poetry and chuildren's books to her credit

Selected Bibliography

Novels

  • The Single Hound (?/1991)
  • The Bridge of Years (1946/1985)
  • Shadow of a Man (1950/1982)
  • A Shower of Summer Days (1952/1995)
  • Faithful Are the Wounds (1955/1997)
  • The Birth of the Grandfather (1957/1989)
  • The Fur Person (1957/1983)
  • The Small Room (1961/1976)
  • Joanna & Ulysses (?/1987)
  • The Mrs. Stevens Hears the Mermaids Singing (1965/1993)
  • Miss Pickthorn & Mr. Hare (1968)
  • The Poet & the Donkey (1969/1996)
  • Kinds of Love (1970/1994)
  • As We Are Now (1973/1992)
  • Crucial Conversations (1975/1994)
  • A Reckoning (1978/1997)
  • Anger (1982/1996)
  • The Magnificent Spinster (1985/1995)
  • The Education of Harriet Hatfield (1989/1993)

Poetry:

  • Encounter in April
  • Inner Landscape
  • The Lion & the Rose
  • The Land of Silence
  • In Time Like Air
  • Cloud Stone Sun Vine
  • A Private Mythology (?/1996)
  • As Does New Hampshire (1967)
  • A Grain of Mustard Seed (1971/1987)
  • A Durable Fire (1972)
  • Collected Poems 1930-1973 (1974)
  • Selected Poems of May Sarton (1978)
  • Halfway to Silence (1980)
  • Letters from Maine: Poems (1984/1997)
  • The Silence Now (1988/1990; includes earlier uncollected poems as well as new poems)
  • Collected Poems 1930-1993 (1993)
  • Coming into Eighty: New Poems (1994/1997)

Books for Children:

  • Punch's Secret (1974)
  • A Walk Through the Woods (1976)

Non-Fiction & Anthologies:

  • I Knew A Phoenix: Sketches for an Autobiography (1959/1996)
  • Plant Dreaming Deep (1968/1996)
  • Journal of a Solitude(1973/1992)
  • A World of Light: Portraits & Celebrations (1976/1988)
  • The House by the Sea (1977/1996)
  • Recovering: A Journal (1980)
  • Writings on Writing (1980)
  • May Sarton--A Self-Portrait (1982)
  • At Seventy: A Journal (1984/1993)
  • Letters to May (1986; by Eleanor Mabel Sarton)
  • After the Stroke: A Journal (1988/1990)
  • Honey in the Hive: Judith Matlack 1898-1982 (1988)
  • Conversations with May Sarton (1991), ed. Earl Ingersoll
  • Sarton Selected: An Anthology of the Journals, Novels, and Poems of May Sarton (1991)
  • Endgame: A Journal of the Seventy-Ninth Year (1992/1996)
  • May Sarton: Among the Usual Days: A Portrait, Unpublished Poems, Letters, Journals, and Photographs (1993; ed. Susan Sherman)
  • Encore: A Journal of the Eightieth Year (1993)
  • From May Sarton's Well: Writings of May Sarton (1994/1999)
  • At Eighty-Two: A Journal (1996/1997)
  • Selected Letters: 1916-1954 (Vol 1) (1997)
  • Dear Juliette: Letters of May Sarton to Juliette Huxley (1999)

Selected Resources

Jewett, Sarah Orne (1849 - 1909)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Poetry

Jewett was born and lived all her life in South Berwick, ME. Most famous in Maine for The Country of the Pointed Firs(1896), she also wrote A Country Doctor (1884) which she based on the life of her late father, numerous other short stories, as well as poetry.

She wrote her earliest pieces under the names Alice Eliott or A.C. Eliott. Many of her stories were first published in the Century, Harper's, or Atlantic Monthly.

One of her influences was Harriet Beecher Stowe. As a writer who could portray a local society sympathetically but without sentiment, Jewett (in turn) influenced Willa Cather. In fact, Cather wrote the introduction to the 1954 edition of Country of the Pointed Firs.

Selected Bibliography

  • Deephaven (1877) first published in Atlantic Monthly
  • Play Days (1878; for children)
  • Old Friends and New (1879)
  • Country By-Ways (1881)
  • The Mate of the Daylight and Friends Ashore (1883)
  • A Marsh Island (1885; a novel)
  • The Dulham Ladies (1886)
  • "A White Heron" (1886)
  • The King of Folly Island and Other People (1888)
  • Betty Leicester (1889; for children)
  • Tales of New England (1890)
  • Strangers and Wayfarers (1890)
  • A Native of Winby (1893)
  • The Life of Nancy (1895)
  • Betty Leicester's English Christmas (1897; for children)
  • The Queen's Twin (1899)
  • The Tory Lover (1901; a novel)

Selected Resources

Selected Links

Sawtell, William (1946 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

William Sawtell, Maine author and wilderness historian, was born July 5, 1946 and has lived in Brownville, Maine all his life. He has written over 25 non-fiction books.

Selected Bibliography

  • Katahdin Iron Works: Boom to Bust (1982)
  • Katahdin Iron Works Revisited (1983)
  • 20th Century Corinna (1984)
  • A History of Lake View Maine (1985)
  • Early Brownville and Her Slate Quarries (1987)
  • K.I. III (1988)
  • Onawa Revisited (1989)
  • Lake View Revisited: A Centennial Book (1991)
  • The History of the Charles A. Dean Memorial Hospital, 1911-1991 (1992; hospital is in Greenville)
  • The Penquis Top 10 - and then some: the first quarter century (1968-1973) at Penquis Valley High School in Milo, Maine (1993)
  • Gary from Greenville: A Fastbreak from Heaven (1993)
  • Katahdin Iron Works and Gulf Hagas: Before and Beyond (1993)
  • Fox Business with Accounts from Fox Farms in Maine (1994)
  • Slate, Rails, and Men: The History of Brownville (1994)
  • Glimpses of Greenville (1995)
  • Medford Revisited (1996)
  • Monson Academy Revisited 1847-1997 (1997)
  • Old Sebec, Vol. 1 (1999)
  • The Albion Antelope: The Ron Marks Story (2002)
  • The Wall (2003)

Saum, Karen (1935 - )

Genre: Mystery

Mystery writer Karen Saum, born January 17, 1935, lives in the Belfast area and sets her books in Maine. She is the creator of sleuth Brigid Donovan, a lesbian former nun and writer.

Her mystery novels featuring Brigid Donovan are Murder is Relative, published in 1990 and set in Quebec City, rural Maine, and Manhattan; Murder is Germaine, published in 1991 and set in Maine and the country of Panama; and Murder is Material, published in 1994 and set in Maine.

She's also written I Never Read Thoreau: A Mystery Novel (not part of the Brigid Donovan series) which takes place on small Monte Cassino island off the coast of Maine and involves the smuggling of illegal aliens into Canada.

Selected Bibliography

  • Murder is Relative (1990)
  • Murder is Germaine (1991)
  • Murder is Material (1994)
  • I Never Read Thoreau: A Mystery Novel (1996)

Johnson, Eleanor (1909 - 2004)

Genre: Children's Literature

Eleanor Noyes Johnson or Lorna, as she is known by her family and close friends, was a native of Newburyport, Massachusetts. She was a 1932 University of New Hampshire graduate, had a master's degree from New York University, and taught for many years (1959-1974) at the former Westbrook Junior College (now the Portland campus for the University of New England. Johnson also taught for 10 years at Stephans College in Missouri and for 4 years at Oldsfield School in Washington.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mountaintop Summer (1959)
  • Buffington Castle (1962)
  • Armitage Hall (1965)
  • King Alfred the Great (1966)
  • Mrs. Perley's People (1970)
  • Pirate, The Lighthouse Cat (1986)
  • Whistle Him In: The Story of a Maine Seal (1985)
  • The Wishing Year (1997)

Selected Resources

Sawyer, Ruth (1880 - 1970)

Genre: Children's Literature

Ruth Sawyer, born in Boston on August 5, 1880 and raised in New York, summered in Maine and eventually moved to Hancock, Maine, where she died on 3 June 1970 after a long and prolific writing career. She began the first storytelling program for children at the New York Public Library and became Robert McCloskey's mother-in-law when her daughter Margaret married the well-known author of such books as Make Way for Ducklings and Blueberries for Sal.

Sawyer won the Newbery Medal in 1937 for her book Roller Skates and was awarded the Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal in 1965 for her contribution to children's literature.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Primrose Ring (1915; ill. Fanny Munsell)
  • Seven Miles to Arden (1916)
  • This Way To Christmas (1916/1952; ill. Maginel W. Barney)
  • Doctor Danny (1918; ill. J. Scott Williams)
  • Leerie (1920; ill. Clinton Balmer)
  • Folkhouse: The Autobiography of a Home (1932)
  • Roller Skates (1936/1995; ill. Valenti Angelo; Newbery winner)
  • Gallant: The Story of Storm Veblen (1936)
  • The Year of Jubilo (1940; ill. Edward Shenton)
  • The Least One (1941; ill. Leo Politi)
  • The Long Christmas (1941; ill. Valenti Angelo)
  • This is the Christmas, a Serbian Folktale (1945)
  • Old Con and Patrick (1946; ill. Cathal O'Toole)
  • The Christmas Anna Angel (1949; ill. Kate Seredy)
  • The Little Red Horse (1950; ill. Jay H. Barnum)
  • The Gold of Bernardino (1952)
  • Maggie Rose, Her Birthday Christmas (1952; ill. Maurice Sendak)
  • Journey Cake, Ho! (1953/1982; ill. Robert McCloskey)
  • A Cottage For Betsy (1954; ill. Vera Bock)
  • The Enchanted Schoolhouse (1956; ill. Hugh Troy)
  • The Year of the Christmas Dragon (1960; ill. Hugh Troy)
  • Dietrick of Berne and the Dwarf King Laurin (1963)
  • Daddles, the Story of a Plain Hound-Dog (1964; ill. Robert Frankenberg)
  • Joy to the World: Christmas Legends (1966/1969; ill. Trina S. Hyman)
  • My Spain: A Storyteller's Year of Collecting (1967)
  • The Remarkable Christmas of the Cobbler's Sons (1994; told by Ruth Sawyer, ill. Barbara Cooney)

Selected links

Selected Resources

Johnson, Willis (1938 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Born in Norwalk, Conn., Willis Johnson was a reporter for over 20 years, working in Korea on a newspaper, in Vietnam for the Associated Press, in Australia for radio and TV, and in the U.S. for daily newspapers. He moved to Maine in 1966, where he has been the writing coach for the Brunswick Times Record, state house reporter for the AP, and a short-story writer.

Bibliography

Fiction

  • The Girl Who Would Be Russian and Other Stories (1986)

Non-fiction

  • The Year of the Longley (1978)

Scontras, Charles (1929 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Maine labor historian Charles Scontras was born in Buffalo, New York, on November 25, 1929, and grew up in Old Orchard Beach, Maine. Since 1966 his research has focused on the history of labor in Maine industries.

Scontras taught for 36 years at the University of Maine in the History and Political Science Departments and is currently a Research Associate at the University's Bureau of Labor Education.

Selected Bibliography

Books

  • A Decade Of Organized Labor And Labor Politics In Maine, 1880-1890 (1965)
  • Two Decades of Organized Labor and Labor Politics in Maine, 1880-1900 (1969)
  • Organized Labor in Maine: Twentieth Century Origins (1985)
  • The Socialist Alternative: Utopian Experiments and the Socialist Party of Maine, 1895-1914 (1985)
  • The Origins of Labor Day in Maine and Historical Glimpses of Labor in Parade in Early Nineteenth Century Maine (1989)
  • Collective Efforts Among Maine Workers: Beginnings and Foundations, 1820-1880 (1994)
  • Samuel Gompers and the American Federation of Labor vs. Maine's Congressman Charles E. Littlefield: 1900-1913 (1998)
  • In The Name of Humanity: Maine's Crusade Against Child Labor (2000)
  • Organized Labor in Maine: War, Reaction, Depression, and The Rise of the CIO 1914-1943 (2002)
  • Time-Line of Selected Highlights of Maine Labor History: 1636-2003 (2003)

Articles

Jones, Rufus (1863 - 1948)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Jones lived in South China, Maine, and authored dozens of books about ethics and Quaker (Society of Friends) history. He was also a well-known Haverford College philosophy professor for forty years. His autobiography is called A Small-Town Boy (1941).

Selected Bibliography

  • Eli and Sybil Jones: Their Life and Work (1889)
  • The Society of Friends in Kennebec County, Maine (1892)
  • A Boy's Religion From Memory (1902)
  • Practical Christianity: Essays on the Practice of Religion (1905)
  • A Dynamic Faith (1906)
  • Little Book of Selections from The Children of the Light (1909)
  • Studies in Mystical Religion (1909)
  • The Quakers in the American Colonies (1911/1962/1966)
  • Spiritual Reformers in the 16th and 17th Centuries (1914/1928/1971)
  • The Inner Life (1916)
  • St. Paul, the Hero (1917)
  • The Religious History of New England: King's Chapel Lectures (1917; with others)
  • The World Within (1918)
  • The Quaker Conception of the Church (1918)
  • The Remnant (1920)
  • A Service of Love in War Time: American Friends Relief Work in Europe, 1917-1919 (1920)
  • The Later Periods of Quakerism (1921/1970)
  • The Boy Jesus and His Companions (1922/1930)
  • Social Life in the Spiritual World: Studies in Human and Divine Inter-Relationship (1923)
  • The Church's Debt to Heretics (1924)
  • Fundamental Ends of Life (1924)
  • The Life of Christ (1926)
  • Finding the Trail of Life (1926)
  • The Faith and Practice of the Quakers (1927/1938)
  • New Studies in Mystical Religion (1927/1974; lectures at Union Theological Seminary, NY)
  • The New Quest (1928)
  • Story of Hebrew Heroes (1928)
  • The Trail of Life in College (1929)
  • George Fox: Seeker and Friend (1930)
  • Some Exponents of Mystical Religion (1930)
  • Pathways to the Reality of God (1931)
  • Mysticism and Democracy in the English Commonwealth (1932; lectures)
  • A Preface to Christian Faith in a New Age (1932)
  • Haverford College: A History and An Interpretation (1933)
  • The Trail of Life in the Middle Years (1934)
  • Re-Thinking Religious Liberalism (1935)
  • The Testimony of the Soul (1936)
  • Spiritual Energies in Daily Life (1936)
  • The Double Search: God's Search for Man and Man's Search for God: Studies in Atonement and Prayer (1937)
  • Some Problems of Life (1937)
  • The Eternal Gospel (1938)
  • The Flowering of God: Friends of the God in the Fourteenth Century (1939)
  • Rethinking Quaker Principles (1940)
  • The Shepherd Who Missed the Manger (1941)
  • Spirit in Man (1941)
  • A Great Experiment (1942)
  • The Story of George Fox (1943)
  • The Evolution of the Soul (1943)
  • New Eyes for Invisibles (1943)
  • The American Friends in France, 1917-1919 (1943)
  • Jewish Mysticism (1943)
  • The Radiant Life (1944)
  • The Luminous Trail (1947)
  • A Call to What is Vital (1948)
  • Addresses about South China (1955)
  • Quakerism: A Spiritual Movement (1963; six essays, with a sketch of his life by Mary Hoxie Jones)
  • Mysticism in Robert Browning (1971)

Selected Resources

  • A bibliography of the published writings of Rufus M. Jones compiled by Nixon Orwin Rush ; together with a brief account of his life (1944)
  • Rufus Jones, Master Quaker by David Hinshaw (1951)

Selected Links

Sharmat, Marjorie (1928 - 2019)

Genre: Children's Literature, Young Adult

Marjorie Sharmat, a popular children's writer, was born on November 12, 1928 in Portland, Maine and knew from childhood that she wanted to be a writer.

Her first book for children, Rex, was published in 1967. Although most of Sharmat's books are either picture books or Easy Readers, she also writes for middle graders, young adults and has published movie and television show novelizations. She uses the pen name Wendy Andrews for some of her books.

Selected Bibliography - Series

  • Olivia Sharp, Agent for Secrets
  • The Kids on the Bus
  • Nate the Great
  • Maggie Marmelstein
  • Genghis Khan, republished in paperback as the Duz Shedd Stories

Selected Resources

Jordan, William (1927 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Bill Jordan, a Maine native and resident of Portland, is noted for his expertise on Portland and Maine Civil War regimental history.

A University of Maine alumnus with undergraduate and graduate degrees in history, he taught for many years at Westbrook College, Portland (now part of the University of New England). His graduate thesis became the first three chapters of A History of Cape Elizabeth, published in 1965 (facsimile reprint 1987).

He is the creator of what is commonly called the Jordan Index, located in the Portland Room of the Portland Public Library. The index provides subject access to sixteen 18th- and 19th-century Portland area newspapers and was published in 1994 as Index to Portland Newspapers: 1785-1835.

Selected Bibliography

Portland-Related Titles

  • Episodes from the Unitarian Universalist Experience in Maine (1974)
  • The First Parish Church: Unitarian Universalist (1976)
  • Portland's Famed Weathercock 1788-1981 (1981)
  • Shaking the Family Tree: the Records of Portland's Eastern Cemetery (1981)
  • Burial Records, 1717-1962, of the Eastern Cemetery, Portland, Maine (1987)
  • Burial Records, 1811-1980, of the Western Cemetery in Portland, Maine (1987)

Civil War-Related Titles

  • Maine in the War of the Rebellion, 1861-1865: Check List and Bibliography (1962)
  • Maine at Gettysburg 1-3 July 1863 (1963)
  • Maine in the Civil War: a Bibliographical Guide (1976)
  • Red Diamond Regiment: the 17th Maine Infantry, 1862-1865 (1996)
  • The Civil War Journals of John Mead Gould, 1861-1866, edited by Jordan (1997)
  • Our Lady of Victories: a History of the Portland Soldiers and Sailors Monument (1998)

Other Titles

  • A Bibliography of Maine Bibliography (1952)
  • Damages in Maine, co-authored with Thomas J. Quinn (1991 also known as For the Plaintiff: Determining and Proving Damages; For the Defense: Limiting Damages in Maine and as Damages: For Plaintiff and Defense Attorneys in Maine)
  • Insurance Litigation in Maine (1992)
  • Personal Injury Litigation Practice in Maine (1992)

Shetterly, Susan Hand (1942 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Susan Hand Shetterly is a Blue Hill resident and has lived in Maine for over 40 years. She wrote for the now defunct Maine Times, contributes to magazines and poetry journals, and is the recipient of several writing fellowships and grants. Many of her works explore the world of nature and our interactions with the natural world.

Selected Bibliography

  • The New Year's Owl: Encounters With Animals, People & The Land They Share (1986)
  • The Dward Wizard of Uxmal (1990)
  • The Tinker of Salt Cove (1990)
  • Raven's Light (1991)
  • Muwin and the Magic Hare (1993)
  • Shelterwood: Discovering the Forest (1999) - named one of the Outstanding Children's Science Books by The National Science Teachers' Association in 2000.
  • Settled in the Wild: Notes from the Edge of Town (2010)

Joseph, James ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

James Joseph grew up in Rhode Island, but lives in Lovell, Maine, and is the director of publications and editor at Fox Maple Press, Inc., in Brownfield; he's also Webmaster for Biddle Publishing Co. and Audenreen Press. He also edited Joiners' Quarterly, a national timber framing magazine.

Bibliography

  • Shadow of the Serpent: A Coyote Moon Story (1997)
  • The Alternative Building SourceBook (1998) with Steve Chappell

Sholl, Betsy (1945 - 2011)

Genre: Poetry

Poet Betsy Sholl has been a Maine resident since 1983. She was one of the founding members of Alice James Books, a poetry cooperative, which has been located at the University of Maine in Farmington since 1994.

A Portland resident, she teaches at the University of Southern Maine and in the Vermont College MFA in Writing program. Sholl was named Maine's poet laureate (a five-year position) in 2006. Her poetry appears in numerous literary magazines such as Alaska Quarterly, Sou'Wester, Kenyon Review, Beloit Poetry Journal, Prairie Schooner, Field, Ploughshares and Third Coast and she is the winner of several poetry prizes.

In addition to the monographs, Sholl's work has been published in several anthologies such as The Eloquent Edge: 15 Maine Women Writers (1989), Letters to America: Contemporary American Poetry on Race (1995), Boomer Girls (1999), and The Extraordinary Tide (2001). She and 15 other women write of their experiences in Appalachia in Joyce Dyer's Bloodroot: Reflections on Place by Appalachian Women Writers (1998).

Her poem To Walt Whitman in Heaven was read on The Writer's Almanac hosted by Garrison Keillor in August 2004.

Selected Bibliography

  • Changing Faces (1974)
  • Appalachian Winter (1978)
  • Rooms Overhead (1986)
  • The Red Line (1992
  • Pick a Card (1991)
  • Don't Explain (1997)
  • Coastal Bop (2001)
  • Late Psalm (2004)

Selected Links

Josselyn, John (1608 - 1675)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Maine's first natural history writer, Josselyn traveled from London to Scarborough, Maine, in 1638-1639 and 1663-1671 to visit his brother Henry Josselyn. While here, he studied the natural and physical rarities of the new world, and on returning to London wrote two volumes based on his observations.

Selected Bibliography

  • New-England's Rarities Discovered: In Birds, Beasts, Fishes, Serpents and Plants of That Country (1672), said to be a quite accurate catalog of the flora and fauna of the area, and the first mention in print of the dandelion in America (according to Dr. Paul Sears, noted conservationist of Yale University)
  • An Account of Two Voyages to New-England Made During the Years 1638, 1663

Selected Links

Shulman, Alix (1932 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Alix Shulman was born Alix Audrey Kates on September 17, 1932 in Cleveland, Ohio. She graduated from Case Western Reserve University in 1953 and moved to New York at age 20. She has taught writing and literature at a number of universities, including New York University, Yale, the New School, and the Universities of Colorado, Arizona, and Hawaii.

Shulman's 1995 autobiography, Drinking the Rain, reflects on her summers spent in a primitive cabin on a Maine island. It was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and won the Body Mind Spirit Award of Excellence. Her most recent autobiographical work is titled To Love What Is: A Marriage Transformed (2008). Shulman's first novel, Memoirs of an Ex-Prom Queen (1972/2007), established her as a feminist writer, exploring the cultural and sexual atmosphere of the 1950s from a woman's point of view. When her essay 'A Marriage Agreement,' advocating that spouses share childcare and housework equally, was published in 1969, it created much controversy; her 1998 essay The Marriage Disagreement reflects on the original.

Selected Bibliography

Books for Children

  • Bosley on the Number Line (1970)
  • Awake or Asleep (1971)
  • Finders Keepers (1971)

Books for Adults

  • Memoirs of an Ex-Prom Queen (1972)
  • Burning Questions (1978)
  • On the Stroll (1981)
  • In Every Woman's Life (1987)
  • Drinking the Rain (1995)
  • Menage: A Novel (2012)

Books About Emma Goldman

  • To the Barricades; The Anarchist Life of Emma Goldman (1971)
  • Red Emma Speaks: An Emma Goldman Reader editor (1972/1998)
  • Shulman also wrote the Goldman biography for Traffic in Women and Other Essays on Feminism, written by Emma Goldman (1990).

Selected Links

Silber, Terry (1940 - 2003)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Terry Silber was born on June 12, 1940 in Lewiston, Maine and lived for many years on Hedgehog Hill Farm in Sumner, Maine.

A graduate of the University of New Hampshire, Silber worked as art director for The Atlantic Monthly magazine during the 1970's, leaving that position and city life to live full-time in Sumner in 1978.

She wrote about her experience at Hedgehog Hill Farm in A Small Farm In Maine (1988/1992) and collaborated on two other books with her husband Mark, a medical anthropologist and documentary photographer, Growing Herbs and Vegetables from Seed to Harvest (1999) and The Complete Book of Everlastings: Growing, Drying, and Designing with Dried Flowers (1988/1992).

Terry Silber died on July 6, 2003 and her obituary appeared in the Boston Globe. The autumn 1998 issue of People, Places and Plants contains a feature article on the Silbers.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Small Farm In Maine (1988)
  • The Complete Book of Everlastings: Growing, Drying, and Designing with Dried Flowers (1988/1992)
  • Growing Herbs and Vegetables from Seed to Harvest (1999)

Selected Links

Silliker Jr, William (1947 - 2003)

Genre: Illustrator, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Ocean Park (Saco), Maine resident Bill Silliker, Jr., was a wildlife and nature photographer and writer. Born September 25, 1947 in Medford, Massachusetts, he graduated from Nasson College in Springvale, Maine in 1969.

Silliker wrote a monthly column, 'The Maine Camera Hunter,' for The Maine Sportsman magazine and the monthly 'The Camera Hunter' column for the online magazine Nature Photographers. Silliker also wrote articles for Nature Photographer, Outdoor Photographer, and other magazines. Silliker's photography appeared in many publications, including Backpacker, Down East, Field & Stream, National Geographic Society, Outdoor Life, and Sports Afield.

He taught wildlife and nature photography at L.L. Bean's Outdoor Discovery Schools and hosted and co-produced the Maine Public Television nature show 'Special Places' from 1995 to 1997. Through his video production company, P.S. Hemingway, Silliker and co-owner and videographer Steve Pulos produced several videos, including 'You Just Have To Love Bears,' 'Maine's Magnificent Moose,' 'Loons of the Northern Forest,' 'SeaBirds of the Maine Coast' and 'The Story of Baxter State Park: Nature At Peace.'

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Moose Watcher's Guide (1993)
  • Moose - Giant of the Northern Forest (1998)
  • Uses For Mooses and Other (Silly) Observations (2000)
  • Moose Watchers Handbook (2001)
  • Saving Maine: An Album of Conservation Success Stories (2002)
  • Wild Maine: Discoveries of a Wildlife Photographer (2004)
  • Just Loons (1998; text by Alan E. Hutchinson)
  • Just Eagles: A Wildlife Watcher's Guide (2000; text by Alan E. Hutchinson)
  • Silliker's Ocean Park Restaurant Cookbook: A Recipe Feast! 1908-1978 (1994, with Ruth L. Silliker)

Simpson, Dorothy (1905 - 1998)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Young Adult

Aleda Dorothy Knowlton (Dot) Simpson, born June 28, 1905, grew up on Criehaven Island off the coast of Maine. Later in life, she lived on Gay's Island off Friendship and Cushing with her longtime companion and well-known Maine author, Elizabeth Ogilvie.

After Simpson's death on December 19, 1998 her niece, also named Dorothy Simpson, published The Island's True Child: A Memoir of Growing Up on Criehaven (2003), based on Simpson's unpublished journals dating to 1930.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Maine Islands in Story and Legend (1960/1987)
  • Island In The Bay (1956)
  • The Honest Dollar (1957)
  • A Lesson For Janie (1958)
  • A Matter Of Pride (1959)
  • New Horizons (1961)
  • Visitor from the Sea (1965)

Selected Resources

Smith, Elizabeth (1806 - 1893)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Poetry

Elizabeth Oakes Smith was born on August 12, 1806 near North Yarmouth, Maine. At 16, Elizabeth married Seba Smith, a Portland newspaper editor who is best known for his fictional character Major Jack Dowling. Elizabeth contributed poems and sketches to the Eastern Argus newspaper and acted as editor when her husband was in Boston on book publishing business. Her writing was either published anonymously or over the initial "E."

By the late 1830s, the Smiths experienced bankruptcy as the result of bad investments and the 1837 financial panic. Elizabeth's first novel, Riches Without Wings, or The Cleveland Family (1838), focuses on the panic's effect on the characters' lives. The Smiths then moved to New York City to board with family members and to continue their writing careers. Now identifying herself as either Mrs. Seba Smith or the pseudonymous Ernest Helfenstein, Elizabeth contributed poems and stories to a number of popular magazines such as Godey's Lady's Book and Graham's Magazine.

Smith became a public proponent for women's rights with the publication of 'Woman and Her Needs,' first published as a series of newspaper articles in the New York Tribune and then as a pamphlet in 1851. During the 1850s, she continued her book publishing, but also lectured extensively throughout the eastern United States on women's rights, religious issues and abolition.

During the 1860s Smith wrote dime novels for the Beadle publishing company, one of the most prominent publishers of this type of sensational, cheaply-bound story.

Although Smith wrote an autobiography, A Human Life, it was never published.

Selected Bibliography

  • Riches Without Wings, or The Cleveland Family (1838)
  • The Western Captive (1842)
  • Jack Spanker and The Mermaid (1843)
  • The Poetical Writings of Elizabeth Oakes Smith (1845)
  • The Salamander: a Legend for Christmas, Found Amongst The Papers of The Late Ernest Helfenstein (1848)
  • The Dandelion (1843)
  • The True Child (1845)
  • The Moss Cup (1846)
  • The Lover's Gift: or Tributes to the Beautiful (1850)
  • Shadow Land, or The Seer (1852)
  • Hints on Dress and Beauty (c.1851)
  • The Newsboy (1854)
  • Bertha and Lily; or, The Parsonage of Beech Glen, A Romance (1854)
  • Black Hollow (1864)
  • Bald Eagle: or, The Last of the Ramapaughs: a Romance of Revolutionary Times (1867)
  • The Sagamore of Saco (1868)

Selected resources

Wiggins, James (1903 - 2000)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

J. Russell (Russ) Wiggins, a voracious reader, was born in Luverne, Minnesota, on 4 Dec. 1903 and died in Brooklin, Maine, on 19 Nov. 2000.

He was managing editor and then chief editor of The Washington Post from 1947 until 1968. He was named by President Lyndon B. Johnson as ambassador to the United Nations in 1968, serving until Nixon's inauguration in 1969.

Wiggins and his family moved permanently to Brooklin, Maine (his previous summer residence), in 1969, where he published the weekly Ellsworth American, which he had bought in 1966; he sold it in 1989 but remained editor until his death.

He never attended college but had ten honorary degrees and was said to read a book a day. He served in the Army Air Force during World War II, as an intelligence officer in Washington, North Africa and Italy.

Wiggins was married for 67 years, and had four children (three of whom pre-deceased him).

He died in 2000 and is buried in Sedgwick, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Down East Poems and Pictures: From the Ellsworth American 1984-1991 (1993)
  • Down East Pictures and Poems (1976)
  • Freedom or Secrecy (1956)
  • Handbook of the St. Paul Pioneer Press and St. Paul Dispatch, July, 1945: A Guide to Policy and Style (1945)
  • Civil Rights, the Constitution, and the Courts (1967), with Archibald Cox and Mark DeWolfe Howe

Selected Links

Smith, Mason (1933 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Writer and photographer Mason Smith lives in Cape Elizabeth, Maine and has written books about seafaring history. These include Four Short Blasts: The Gale of 1898 and The Loss of the Steamer Portland (1998), with Peter Dow Bachelder. One of those who perished on the steamer Portland was Jes Jessen Schmidt, the brother of Smith's grandfather, Hans Schmidt. Jes Schmidt was returning from a trip to Denmark with his wife and children when he went down with the ship. For more detailed information about the sinking of the Portland, check out John Richardson's Ship of Doom article.

Selected Bibliography

  • Confederates Downeast: Confederate Operations In and Around Maine (1985)
  • Spies Ashore: The German World War II Landings in North America (2000)
  • Keep Your Courage and Don't Worry About the Future: The Letters of a Maine Family, editor (2001).

Beckman, Siri (1942 - )

Genre: Illustrator

Siri Beckman, a Stonington resident (born Feb. 23, 1942), is an artist/writer whose wood engravings and monotypes have appeared in the Island Institute's Island Journal as well as in her own limited edition books and in the books of other writers and poets.

She earned a B.A. from Lake Forest College in Illinois and an M.F.A. in book arts and printmaking from the University of Arts, Philadelphia.

A highly respected teacher who has taught at various colleges and art centers such as the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, she is an adjunct professor in the Department of Art. She owns Out of the Woods Press.

Beckman's wood engravings are in both private and museum collections and have been exhibited at numerous museums and special libraries. A 1993 exhibit at the Houghton Library, Harvard, was accompanied by a catalog titled Why Artists' Books?: Siri Beckman, Meryl Brater, Brian D.Cohen, Deborah Davidson, Laura Davidson, Roberta Delaney, Jean Evans, Becky Hunt, Joyce McDaniel, Peter Maden, Maria Muller, Stephanie Stigliano.

Selected Bibliography

Author

  • A Dog Named Blackberry (1989)
  • A Small Victory (1991)
  • In Away (1992).
  • A Week at the Lake (1998) The book is a diary of a vacation taken by Grace Butterfield Dow in 1932. A trade paperback of the book was published by Down East Books in 2001.
  • Lighthouse (1993) is a small accordion-folded artist book with ten wood engravings.

Illustrator

  • The Tinker of Salt Cove by Susan Hand Shetterly (1990)
  • Crossing the Field by Kate Barnes (1992)
  • Speaking of New England: The Place & Her People: 72 Poems by 56 of Her Poets, Past and Present (1993), edited by Richard Aldridge.

Beem, Edgar (1949 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Art critic and freelance writer Edgar Allen Beem (born 22 Feb. 1949) is a Yarmouth resident. He lived in Westbrook during his childhood and young adult years and is a 1971 graduate of University of Maine Portland-Gorham, a precursor of today's University of Southern Maine, majoring in philosophy.

In addition to his extensive Maine Times publishing, Beem's articles have appeared in such diverse publications as Photo District News, Down East, Yankee, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, and Teacher Magazine. His subjects have included art, architecture and interviews.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Art Now (1990), a collection of art reviews, originally published in the (now-defunct) Maine Times
  • Maine: Art of the State (2000), part of Harry M. Abrams, Inc. 'Art of the State' series.
  • Backyard Maine : local essays (2009)

Benedict, Dianne (1941 - )

Genre: Short Stories

Dianne Benedict (born 17 Sept. 1941) is on the faculty of the Univ. of Southern Maine's English Dept. She has also taught in the MFA Writing Program at Vermont College, the Iowa Writers' Workshop, and the Stonecoast Writers' Conference (Brunswick, ME). Her collection of short stories, Shiny Objects (1982) won the Iowa Short Fiction Award. Other awards include an NEA Fellowship and a Maine Arts Commission Fellowship. She has had work published in Best American Short Stories, The New England Review, and The Atlantic Monthly.

Selected Bibliography

  • Shiny Objects (1982)

Bepko, Claudia (1948 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Claudia Bepko, MSW (born 15 April 1948), a mental health and addictions social worker and family therapist, grew up in a small town in Connecticut and now works in Brunswick, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Too Good For Her Own Good: Searching for Self and Intimacy in Important Relationships (1991, with Jo-Ann Krestan)
  • The Heart's Progress: A Lesbian Memoir (1997) a memoir.
  • Feminism and Addiction (1991), edited,
  • The Responsibility Trap: A Blueprint for Treating the Alcoholic Family (1985; with Jo-Ann Krestan)
  • At the Top of Our Lungs (1993/1994; with Jo-Ann Krestan).

Berry, Holly (1957 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Artist, printmaker, and children's book illustrator Holly Berry, is a native of Kennebunk who lives on a blueberry farm in Waldoboro with her family.

She received her B.F.A. in illustration from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1979 and did graduate work as an M.F.A. candidate at Boston University. She has taught at both schools and conducted workshops throughout the state of Maine.

Her original illustrations have been shown at the Society of Illustrators, The Art Institute of Chicago, the Center for Maine Contemporary Art, and in other juried, invitational and traveling exhibits. She is especially known for her linoleum block print reliefs. She has also done work for textbooks, toys, magazines and T-shirts.

Selected Bibliography

Author and Illustrator

  • Busy Lizzie (1994)
  • Old MacDonald Had a Farm (1997)

Illustrator

  • The Gift of Christmas by Philemon Sturges (1995)
  • Market Day by Eve Bunting (1995) won a 1996 Golden Kite Award for illustration
  • The Bowlegged Rooster and Other Tales That Signify by Joyce Carol Thomas (2000)
  • The Impudent Rooster by Sabina I. Rascol (2004) won the Society of Illustrators' silver medal
  • How Mama Brought the Spring (2008) by Fran Manushkin

Beston, Henry (1888 - 1968)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Henry Beston (born June 1, 1888 in Boston as Henry Beston Sheahan), naturalist and writer, received his bachelors (1908) and masters (1911) degrees from Harvard, and an honorary degree from Bowdoin in 1953. He also served with the Harvard Ambulance Service in World War I. He was a journalist and the editor of Living Age in the early 1920s. He and his wife, writer Elizabeth Coatsworth, lived on 'Chimney Farm' in Nobleboro, Maine, and in Hingham, Massachusetts. Their daughter, Kate Barnes, was Maine's first poet laureate.

Composer Ronald Perera wrote a choral work called The Outermost House, on a commission from the Chatham Chorale of Cape Cod; the piece takes as its text excerpts from Beston's The Outermost House.

Beston died in Nobleboro on 15 April 1968.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Volunteer Poilu (1916), a World War I narrative
  • The Firelight Fairy Book (1919; illus. Maurice E. Day)
  • Fullspeed Ahead: Tales from the Log of a Correspondent with our Navy (1919)
  • Starlight Wonder Book (1923; illus. Maurice E. Day)
  • The Book of Gallant Vagabonds (1925), biographical sketches of adventurers
  • The Sons of Kai: The Story the Indian Told (1926)
  • The Tree That Ran Away (1941; illus. Fritz Eichenberg)
  • Northern Farm: A Chronicle of Maine (1948; illus. Thoreau MacDonald)
  • Especially Maine: The Natural World of Henry Beston (1970)
  • White Pines and Blue Water: A State of Maine Reader (1950), editor
  • Best of Beston: A selection from the natural world of Henry Beston from Cape Cod to the St. Lawrence, (2000) edited and introduced by Elizabeth Coatsworth

Selected Resources

Hopkinson, Deborah (1942 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Deborah Hopkinson was born on 13 Sept. 1942, grew up in Lowell, MA and, as a child, vacationed yearly in Rangeley, ME. Deborah received a bachelor?s degree in English at the University of Massachusetts and holds a master?s degree in Asian Studies from the University of Hawaii at Manoa. She lives near Portland, Oregon, where she serves as Vice President for College Advancement for the Pacific Northwest College of Art.

Hopkinson has a website with more info on her and her books, and links for teachers and kids.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sweet Clara and the Freedom Quilt (1994)
  • Birdie's Lighthouse (1997)
  • A Band of Angels (1999)
  • Bluebird Summer (2001)
  • Fannie in the Kitchen: The Whole Story From Soup to Nuts of How Fannie Farmer Invented Recipes with Precise Measurements (2001)
  • Prairie Skies: Pioneer Summer (2003)
  • Prairie Skies: Cabin in the Snow (2002)
  • Under the Quilt of Night (2002)
  • Maria's Comet (2003)
  • Our Kansas Home (2003)
  • Shutting Out the Sky: Life in the Tenements of New York, 1880-1924 (2003)
  • Girl Wonder: A Baseball Story in Nine Innings (2003/2006)
  • The Klondike Kid: Sailing for Gold (2003)
  • The Long Trail (2004)
  • The Klondike Kid: Adventure in Gold Town (2004)
  • Apples to Oregon: Being the (Slightly) True Narrative of How a Brave Pioneer Father Brought Apples, Peaches, Pears, Plums, Grapes, and Cherries (and Children) Across the Plains (2004)
  • A Packet of Seeds (2004)
  • Hear My Sorrow: The Diary of Angela Denoto, A Shirtwaist Worker (2004)
  • John Adams Speaks for Freedom (2005)
  • Billy and the Rebel: Based on a True Civil War Story (2005)
  • Who Was Charles Darwin? (2005), with Nancy Harrison
  • Saving Strawberry Farm (2005)
  • From Slave to Soldier: Based on a True Civil War Story (2005)
  • Susan B. Anthony : Fighter for Women's Rights (2005)
  • Sky Boys: How They Built the Empire State Building (2006)
  • Up Before Daybreak: Cotton And People In America (2006)
  • Into the Firestorm: A Novel of San Francisco, 1906 (2006)

Selected Links

Hornberger M.D., H. Richard (1924 - 1997)

Genre: General Fiction

Richard Hornberger received his medical degree from Cornell Medical School, specialized in surgery, and served as an Army Medical Corps surgeon with the 8055th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital in Korea; his war experiences were the basis for his very popular novel (written as Richard Hooker), MASH (1968), which he wrote while waiting for patients at his offices in Bremen, Maine. It was made into a movie in 1970 (screenplay by Ring Lardner, Jr.) and a long-running television series (1972-1983).

He based the character of Benjamin Franklin "Hawkeye" Pierce on himself, although the political conservative said he said he never liked actor Alan Alda's portrayal of the character in the TV series.

After the war, Hornberger worked briefly in a veterans' hospital before opening a surgical practice in Waterville, Maine, which he maintained until retirement in 1988. He died of leukemia in 1997.

Co-author William E. Butterworth is also known as W.E.B. Griffin, the military novelist.

Selected Bibliography

  • MASH (1968) written with sportswriter Wilfred C. Heinz
  • MASH Goes to Maine (1971)
  • MASH Goes to New Orleans (1974) with William E Butterworth
  • MASH Goes to Paris (1974) with William E Butterworth
  • MASH Goes to London (1975) with William E Butterworth
  • MASH Goes to Morocco (1975) with William E Butterworth
  • MASH Goes to Hollywood (1976) with William E Butterworth
  • MASH Goes to Las Vegas (1976) with William E Butterworth
  • MASH Goes to Miami (1976) with William E Butterworth
  • MASH Goes to San Francisco (1976) with William E Butterworth
  • MASH Goes to Vienna (1976) with William E Butterworth
  • MASH Goes to Montreal (1977) with William E Butterworth
  • MASH Goes to Moscow (1977) with William E Butterworth
  • MASH Goes to Texas (1977) with William E Butterworth
  • MASH Mania (1977)

Selected Resources

Howard, Blanche (1847 - 1898)

Genre: General Fiction

Born in Bangor, Blanche Willis Howard was a popular novelist who wrote romantic tales and several travel books. In 1875, she published her first novel, One Summer, which had a Maine setting. The popularity of the novel gave Howard name recognition and enabled her to obtain an assignment from the Boston Evening Transcript.

She toured Europe and wrote articles about travel and local customs. With the exception of returning to the United States for visits with her family and to meet with her American publishers, she remained in Stuttgart, Germany, where she continued to write and also studied music, philosophy, and science.

Documents in the Maine Women Writers Collection suggest she also conducted some type of finishing school for American girls and young women.

In 1890 she married Dr. Julius von Teuffel, a physician, and she became the Baroness von Teuffel.

Selected Bibliography

  • One Summer (1875)
  • One Year Abroad (1877)
  • Aunt Serena (1881)
  • Guenn, A Wave on the Breton Coast (1884)
  • Aulnay Tower (1885)
  • Tony the Maid, A Novelette (1887)
  • The Open Door (1889)
  • A Battle and a Boy; A Story for Young People (1892)
  • A Fellowe and His Wife (1892)
  • No Heroes (1893)
  • Seven on the Highway (1897)
  • Dionysius the Weaver's Heart's Dearest (1899)
  • The Garden of Eden (1900)
  • The Humming Top, Or Debt and Credit in the Next World (1890), translation of a German story by Theobald Gross

Hubbell, Sue (1935 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Born in Kalamazoo, Michigan in 1935, Sue Hubbell attended Swarthmore College and the University of Michigan before receiving her A.B. in journalism from the University of Southern California in 1956. She also earned an M.S. from Drexel Institute in 1963.

She has been a book store manager, an elementary school librarian, and was also employed as a librarian by Trenton State College, Trenton, NJ, and by Brown University, Providence, RI. Her brother, Bil Gilbert, is also a prolific naturalist author.

In 1973, Hubbell and her first husband, Paul Hubbell, both of whom were anti-war activists, made the decision to leave their positions at Brown and the University of Rhode Island and significantly reduce their incomes so they would not be contributing taxes to the war effort. For a year they and their son Brian traveled around the country before deciding to purchase land in Missouri where they became commercial beekeepers. When she and her husband divorced after 30 years of marriage, Hubbell continued the honey business alone.

To supplement her income, Hubbell wrote articles for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Thirty-three of the articles were later published in On This Hilltop (1991). In an interview in the January 1996 Missouri Conservationist Magazine Online, Hubbell speaks about life on her farm and about writing Country Year: Living the Questions (1986), which brought her immediate attention from both book critics and general readers. The book, considered an American natural history classic, remains in print in a variety of editions.

At the time of the Missouri Conservationist interview, Hubbell was spending part of her time in Missouri and the rest of her time in Washington, D.C., where her second husband, [Frank] Arne Sieverts, worked for the international Committee of the Red Cross. Hubbell has since sold the Missouri farm and purchased a house in a small Maine coastal town. Just as she never revealed where she lived in Missouri, Hubbell will not tell where her Maine home is located as she does not want her house to become a tourist attraction. Her second husband died in April 2004.

Hubbell has also written magazine articles, a number of which have been published in Smithsonian, The New Yorker, and The New York Times Magazine. One of her articles, "The Mystery of the Donut's Hole," in which she presents her research about camel crickets, can be found in the already mentioned Missouri Conservationist Magazine online. Hubbell has also written a new introduction to new edition of Rachel Carson's The Edge of the Sea (1998).

Selected Bibliography

  • Book of Bees: And How to Keep Them (1989)
  • Broadsides from the Other Orders: A Book of Bugs (1993)
  • Far-Flung Hubbell: Essays from the American Road (1995)
  • Waiting for Aphrodite: Journeys Into the Time Before Bones (1999)
  • Shrinking the Cat: Genetic Engineering Before We Knew about Genes (2001)
  • From Here to There and Back Again (2004)

Hunting, Constance (1925 - 2006)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Constance Hunting was born in Providence, RI, and lived in Orono from 1968 until her death. She was a classical pianist, a poet and a promoter of other Maine writers, informally and through her Puckerbrush Review literary magazine (established 1978) and Puckerbrush Press publishing company (est. 1971). She also taught English literature and creative writing at the University of Maine (Orono) and was a member of the National Poetry Foundation board.

She received her B.A. from Brown University in 1947, was at Duke University from 1950-53, and then Purdue University from 1953-68. Her husband, Robert, was chair of the English department at the Univ. of Maine for eight years before his death.

Selected Bibliography

Author

  • After the Stravinsky Concert and Other Poems (1969)
  • Cimmerian and Other Poems (1972)
  • Beyond the Summerhouse: A Narrative Poem (1976)
  • Nightwalk and Other Poems (1980)
  • Dream Cities (1982)
  • Collected Poems, 1969-1982 (1983)
  • A Day at the Shore: A Poem (1983)
  • Between the Worlds: Poems 1983-1988 (1989)
  • Hawkedon (1990)
  • The Myth of Horizon (1991)
  • At Rochebonne: A Poem (1994)
  • The Experience of Art: Selected Essays and Interviews (1997)
  • The Shape of Memory (1998)
  • Natural Things: Collected Poems 1969-1998 (1999)
  • An Amazement (2002)
  • The Sky Flower (2005)

Editor

  • May Sarton, Woman and Poet (1982)
  • A Celebration for May Sarton: Essays and Speeches from the National Conference "May Sarton at 80" (1994)

Co-Editor

  • New Maine Writing (1977)(with Lee Skarkey)
  • New Maine Writing: Number Two (1979)(with Lee Skarkey)
  • In a Dark Time: An Anthology of Poetry of Nuclear Concern (1983) (with Virgil Bisset)

Selected Resources

Betit, Paul (1946 - )

Genre: Mystery

Paul Betit was born (Nov. 10, 1946) and raised in Augusta and lives in Brunswick, Maine.

He earned his B.A. in journalism from the University of Maine.

For more than 30 years has worked as a newspaper reporter, most recently as a staff writer and sportswriter for the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram.

Betit is a Vietnam veteran who did communications intelligence work at Phu Bai, South Vietnam, and in Eritrea, Ethiopia. He's written two crime novels set in these locales, both featuring the character of John Murphy, an Army Criminal Investigation Division officer. In both, Murphy investigates the mysterious death of a U.S. soldier.

Selected Bibliography

  • Phu Bai: A Vietnam War Story (2004)
  • Kagnew Station (2005)

Beyer, Audrey (1916 - 1985)

Genre: Young Adult

Audrey Beyer was born in Portland on Nov. 12, 1916 and lived in Cape Elizabeth. She attended Westbrook Jr. College (1937), received her bachelor's degree from the University of Maine (1939), and did graduate work at Northeastern University. Her career was spent teaching English at Westbrook College and other schools; in 1960, Westbrook gave her its Award for Alumnae Achievement.

Beyer is best known for her historical fiction for young adults.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dark Venture (1958) won the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award
  • Capture at Sea (1959) won the Jack and Jill Award
  • The Sapphire Pendant (1961)
  • Katharine Leslie (1963)

Selected Resources

Bianco, Gerard (1950 - )

Genre: Mystery

Gerald Bianco was born on Jan. 24 1950 in Brooklyn, New York, and was raised there. He lives in South Portland, Maine where, besides being a mystery author, he is also an award-winning jewelry designer. (His family operated the largest jewelry store in Brooklyn -- John Bianco and Sons Fine Jewelry -- for over 25 years).

He is an illustrator and painter who has studied at the Art Students League, School of Visual Arts, and Parsons School of Art. He owns a jewelry store in Portland.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dying for Deception (2004) (published in 2006 as The Deal Master)

Bogan, Louise (1897 - 1970)

Genre: Poetry

Louise Bogan was born on Aug. 11, 1897 in Livermore Falls; her paternal grandfather was a sea captain out of Portland Harbor. She was raised in Milton, NH, and Ballardvale, MA and she lived most of her adult life in New York City. She was widowed after four years of marriage in 1920; her second marriage was to poet Raymond Holden, lasting from 1925 until their divorce in 1937.

Bogan was poetry editor and critic for The New Yorker from 1931 to 1970. She won the Bollingen Prize in 1955 for her poetry and held the Library of Congress Chair in Poetry from 1945-1946.

Selected Bibliography

  • Body of This Death (1923)
  • Dark Summer (1929)
  • The Sleeping Fury (1937)
  • Poems & New Poems (1941)
  • Achievement in American Poetry 1900-1950 (1951)
  • Collected Poems 1923-1953 (1954)
  • Selected Criticism: Prose, poetry (1955)
  • The Blue Estuaries: Poems 1923-1968 (1968)
  • A Poet's Alphabet: Reflections on the Literary Art & Vocation (1970)
  • The Golden Journey: Poems for Young People (1965) editor.
  • Elective Affinities poetry of Goethe, (1963) translator
  • The Glass Bees poetry of Ernst Junger, (1960) translator.
  • What the Woman Lived: Selected Letters of Louise Bogan 1920-1970 (1973)
  • Journey Around My Room, 1981), a posthumous autobiography

Selected Resources

Bollen, Peter (1948 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Peter Bollen, born in March 24, 1948 in Lynn, MA, and raised there, has lived in Bridgton, Maine since 2003.

He served in the U.S. Navy from 1968 to 1970, and attended North Shore Community College in Beverly, MA. He was editor of the Lynnfield (MA) Beacon, a trade labor journal, in 1989, and editor of The Northeast News Service (MA) from 1989-1996 (editor emeritus since 1996).

He has published occasional essays in newspapers including the Daily Item (Lynn, MA), the North Shore Sunday (Danvers, MA), the Salem (MA) Evening News, and The Bridgton (ME) News.

Bollen initiated a lawsuit -- eventually joined by more than a dozen plaintiffs -- against the Justice Dept. to overturn a prohibition on compensation for freelance writing and speaking for all federal employees; the U.S. Supreme Court agreed and overturned the ban in 1995.

He contributed a biography of folk artist Woody Guthrie to the Postmaster General (1980), which helped result in a commemorative postage stamp of Guthrie as part of the Folk Musicians series.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Handbook of Great Labor Quotations (1983)
  • Nuclear Voices: A Book of Quotations and Perspectives (1986)
  • Great Labor Quotations: Sourcebook and Reader (2000, an update of his 1983 edition)
  • Frank Talk -- The Wit & Wisdom of Barney Frank (2006).

Bonnie, Frederic (1945 - 2000)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Short story writer, novelist, editor, teacher, and gardening writer Fred Bonnie was born on October 11, 1945 in Bridgton, Maine, but spent much of his life near Birmingham, AL, where he moved in 1974 to become gardening editor for Southern Living magazine. He attended the University of Maine in Portland, the University of New Hampshire, Universite de Nice, Harvard University, and Jefferson State Junior College; received a B.A. from the University of Vermont in 1971; and earned an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. (Richard North Patterson was a classmate).

Besides writer and editor, jobs included milkman, caddy, cook, factory worker, house painter, landscaper, teacher (taught fiction writing, University of Alabama Special Studies, 1978-1982), Harvard University and University of Vermont library staffer, salesman, janitor, and literary journal editor and publisher (Isinglass Review, 1968-1974). During the late 1980s, he conducted readings regularly in a bookstore/cafe called NewsBreak in Birmingham. He also helped organize the Birmingham Southern College Writing Today conference annually.

Bonnie died on 13 May 2000.

Selected Bibliography

Gardening Books

  • Growing Flowers (1975, with H. C. Thompson)
  • Growing Lawns and Ground Covers (1975)
  • House Plants (1975)
  • The Compleat Vegetable Book (1976, with Lena Sturges)
  • Flowering Trees, Shrubs, and Vines: a Guide for Home Gardeners (1976)
  • Growing Plants in Containers, Indoors and Out (1976)
  • Vegetable Gardening (1976)

Fiction

  • Squatter's Rights: Stories (1979)
  • Displaced Persons: Stories (1982)
  • Too Hot & Other Maine Stories (1987)
  • Wide Load (1987)
  • Food Fights: Tales from the Restaurant Trade: Stories (1997)
  • Detecting Meta (1998)
  • Widening the Road (2000, revised versions of stories previously published in Canada in Squatter's Rights and Displaced Persons)
  • Thanh Ho Delivers (novel, 2000)

Booth, Philip (1925 - 2007)

Genre: Poetry

Philip Booth, born on Oct. 8, 1925 in Hanover, NH, is a poet who lived in Castine -- in a house that had been his family's for five generations. He was named a Fellow in the Academy of American Poets in 1983.

A Dartmouth graduate, with a Master's degree from Columbia University, Booth served in the Air Force in WWII and taught English at Syracuse University. He was one of Robert Frost's last students. He died at age 81 in Hanover, NH, of complications of Alzheimer's Disease, on July 2, 2007.

Selected Bibliography

  • Letters from a Distant Land (1957) 1956 Lamont Poetry Selection
  • The Islanders (1961)
  • Weathers and Edges (1966)
  • Margins (1970)
  • Available Light (1976)
  • Before Sleep (1980)
  • Relations: Selected Poems, 1950-1985 (1986)
  • Selves (1990)
  • Pairs (1994)
  • Trying to Say It: Outlooks and Insights on How Poems Happen (1996, in the Poets on Poetry series)
  • Lifelines: Selected Poems, 1950-1999 (1999) won the 2001 Poet's Prize
  • Crossing (2001, illus. Bagram Ibatoulline)

Selected Resources

Booth's entry at the Academy of American Poets

Borthwick, J (1923 - 2018)

Genre: Mystery

Borthwick, a pseudonym for Jean Scott Creighton, lives in Thomaston, Maine. She is the author of mystery novels set in Maine featuring professor and amateur sleuth Sarah Deane and love interest Dr. Alex McKenzie.

She has a master's degree, has lectured in English at Indiana University, taught at Maine middle and high schools, and currently teaches a short story course at Coastal Senior College in Thomaston.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Case of the Hook-Billed Kites (1982)
  • The Down East Murders (1985)
  • The Student Body (1986)
  • Bodies of Water (1990)
  • Dude on Arrival (1991)
  • The Bridled Groom (1994)
  • Dolly is Dead (1995/1996)
  • The Garden Plot (1997/1998)
  • My Body Lies Over the Ocean (1999)
  • Coup De Grace (2000)
  • Murder in the Rough (2002)
  • Intensive Scare Unit (2004
  • Foiled Again (2007)

Botelho, Roland (1947 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Young Adult

Roland (RJ) Botelho was born (Oct. 12, 1947) and raised in Rhode Island, later moved to Massachusetts, and then to Maine more than 20 years ago. He lives in Perry, Maine with assorted pets in a hand-hewn log cabin surrounded by forest and wildlife.

Botelho completed undergrad work at the University of Rhode Island and at Providence College, studying computer programming and business administration. He also attended Johnson and Wales culinary arts college. He and his wife opened Rolando's restaurant in Eastport, where they lived and worked for ten years. Other jobs have included real estate agent, carpenter, and antiques dealer. He now works as a nutritionist and cook for the local (Perry) school union.

Botelho writes children's fantasy/science fiction stories about a boy with special abilities.

Selected Bibliography

  • G.A.R.T.H. (Genetically Altered Radically Transformed Human) (2004
  • G.A.R.T.H. (Genetically Altered Radically Transformed Humanically-Transformed)Incidents (2005)
  • G.A.R.T.H (Genetically-Altered-Radically-Transformed) Downeast Maine: A New Beginning (2006)

Boyle, Gerry (1956 - )

Genre: Mystery

Gerry Boyle, a Colby College graduate, was born in Chicago on May 20, 1956, raised in Rhode Island, and now lives in China, Maine. He worked as a journalist and columnist with the Rumford Falls Times and then with the Morning Sentinel (Waterville), until 1999. He became editor of the Colby College Magazine in 2000.

Boyle's crime novels feature a reporter/sleuth, Jack McMorrow

Selected Bibliography

  • Deadline (1993)
  • Bloodline (1995)
  • Lifeline (1996)
  • Potshot (1997)
  • Borderline (1998)
  • Cover Story (2000)
  • Pretty Dead (2003)
  • Home Body (2004)
  • Port City Shakedown (2009)
  • Damaged Goods (2010)
  • Port City Black and White (2011)
  • Deadline (2014)
  • Bloodline (2014)
  • Once Burned (2015)
  • Potshot (2015)
  • Lifeline (2105)
  • Borderline: A Jack McMorrow Mystery (2015)
  • Straw Man: A Jack McMorrow Mystery (2015)
  • Random Act: A Jack McMorrow Mystery (2019)
  • Port City Crossfire: A Brandon Blake Mystery (2019)

Selected Resources

Brace, Gerald (1901 - 1978)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Born on Sept. 23, 1901 on Long Island, New York, Gerald (Jerry) Brace was a writer and teacher who maintained a summer residence on Deer Isle. He earned his undergraduate degree at Amherst Collegeand graduate degrees at Harvard. After teaching at Dartmouth and Mount Holyoke, Brace spent the rest of his teaching career at Boston University.

He died in Blue Hill, Maine, in July 1978.

Most of Brace's novels are set in New England.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Islands (1936)
  • The Wayward Pilgrims (1938)
  • Light on a Mountain (1941)
  • The Garretson Chronicle (1947)
  • A Summer's Tale (1949)
  • The Spire (1952)
  • The World of Carrick's Cove (1947)nominee, 1958 National Book Fiction Award
  • Bell's Landing (1955)
  • Winter Soltice (1960)
  • The Wind's Will (1964)
  • The Department (1968)

Non-Fiction

  • The Age of the Novel (1957)
  • The Stuff of Fiction (1969).
  • Days That Were (1976),his autobiography which included his own illustrations.
  • Between Wind and Water (1966)

Selected Resources

Braestrup, Elizabeth Kate (1962 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Kate Braestrup (born June 5, 1962) grew up in Washington, D.C. and is the daughter of the noted writer/journalist, editor of The Wilson Quarterly Peter Braestrup (1929-1997). Kate's grandfather, Carl Bjorn Braestrup (1897-1982), worked on the Manhattan Project and co-invented a cobalt-therapy machine used for cancer treatment.

Kate met her first husband, James Andrew 'Drew' Griffith, when they were both students at the Corcoran School of Art. They were married in 1985 and moved to Maine in the late 1980s when the Maine State Police hired Griffith. In 1996 he was killed in a vehicle accident while on duty. Her second husband is artist Simon van der Ven

Braestrup lives in Lincolnville with her family. She is a graduate of Bangor Theological Seminary and a community minister affiliated with the First Universalist Church in Rockland. She serves as chaplain for the Maine Warden Service.

Selected Bibliography

Fiction

  • Onion (1990)

Non-Fiction

  • Here If You Need Me (2007)
  • Marriage and Other Acts of Charity (2010)
  • Beginner's Grace: Bringing Prayer to Life (2010)

Selected Resources

Brahms, Ann (1938 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Born in Portland, Maine, on April 19 1938 (1937?), Ann Brahms published autobiographical articles in Greater Portland, Down East, and Good Old Days in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Prior to that, she and her husband co-authored a highly regarded book that has been recommended by the association that places puppies with families who begin the young dogs' training as guide dogs for the blind.

She has written three romantic suspense novels set in Maine and two memoirs.

Selected Bibliography

Fiction

  • The Burying Point (1991)
  • Cloak of Darkness (1992)
  • Run for Your Life (1993)

Non-fiction

  • Puppy Ed: Training Your Dog at an Early Age (1981) with Paul Brahms
  • The Key Is Under the Flower Pot (1999)
  • Nana's House: A Memoir (2003)

Branley, Franklyn (1915 - 2002)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Franklyn Branley, who wrote or co-wrote over 140 science books for children, was born on June 5, 1915 in New Rochelle, N.Y. He attended New Paltz Normal School in New Paltz, N.Y. (now SUNY at New Paltz) and also received degrees in education from New York University and Teachers College at Columbia University. He lived in Sag Harbor, NY, for many years, moving to Thornton Oaks retirement community in Brunswick, Maine in 1998. He died in Brunswick on 5 May 2002. Branley was an astronomer by training, working at in NYC from 1957 to 1972 (chairman from 1968-1972). He also taught science, from kindergarten through college, in New York schools.

While he was teaching at New Jersey's State Teachers College in 1960 he began introducing area kindergartners to the basics of science. His goal was to both provide information and capture the imaginations of his young learners. These books led to his immensely popular (and still reprinted) 'Let's-Read-and-Find-Out Science' series for very young readers (ages 4-9). Branley's books include, the Mysteries series, the Experiments series, the Book For You series, and the Planets series

Selected Bibliography

  • Mickey's Magnet (1956)
  • Rusty Rings A Bell (1957)
  • Timmy and the Tin Can Telephone (1959)
  • Science: Seven and Eight (1945, illus. Scarlett Blanton)
  • Experiments in Science (1947, with Nelson F. Beeler, illus. Ruth Beck)
  • Experiments with Electricity (1949, with Nelson F. Beeler, illus. A.W. Revell)
  • Experiments with Atomics (1954, with Nelson F. Beeler, illus. A.W. Revell)
  • Nine Planets (1958, illus. Helmut K. Wimmer)
  • A Book of Moon Rockets For You (1959, illus. Leonard Kessler)
  • Big Tracks, Little Tracks (1960, illus. Leonard Kessler)
  • Guide to Outer Space (1960, illus. George Geygan)
  • What Makes Day and Night (1961 - illus. Helen Borten; 1986/91 - illus. Arthur Dorros)
  • Sun, Our Nearest Star (1961 - illus. Helen Borten; 1988/97 - illus. Don Madden)
  • Big Dipper (1962 - illus. Ed Emberley; 1991/99 - illus. Molly Coxe)
  • Rain and Hail (1963 - illus. Helen Borten; 1983 - illus. Harriett Barton), published as Down Comes the Rain in 1997, illus. James Graham Hale
  • Flash, Crash, Rumble and Roll (1964)
  • Book of Stars For You (1967, illus. Leonard Kessler)
  • Mystery of Stonehenge (1969, illus. Victor G. Ambrus)
  • Moon: Jack and Jill and Other Legends (1971, illus. Jane Teiko Oka)
  • Eclipse: Darkness in Daytime (1973/88, illus. Donald Crews)
  • Comets, Meteoroids, and Asteroids: Mavericks of the Solar System (1974, illus. Helmut K. Wimmer)
  • A Book of Planet Earth For You (1975, illus. Leonard Kessler)
  • Black Holes, White Dwarfs, and Superstars (1976, illus. Helmut K. Wimmer)
  • Color: From Rainbows to Lasers (1978, illus. Henry Roth)
  • Age of Aquarius: You and Astrology (1979, illus. Leonard Kessler)
  • Jupiter: King of the Gods, Giant of the Planets (1981, illus. Leonard D. Dank)
  • Halley, Comet 1986 (1983, illus. Sally J. Bensusen)
  • From Sputnik to Space Shuttles: Into the New Space Age (1986/89)
  • Astronomy Set 1 (1990), 5-volume set
  • Germs Make Me Sick (1991, with Melvin Berger, illus. Marylin Hafner)
  • International Space Station (2000, illus. True Kelley)

Selected Resources

Brechlin, Earl (1954 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Earl Brechlin (born July 25, 1954), a registered Maine Guide, lives in Bar Harbor with his wife and is a former editor of the Bar Harbor Times and founding editor of the Mount Desert Islander. He is past president of both the Maine Press Association and the New England Press Association.

Brechlin is also an adjunct faculty member at the College of the Atlantic. He earned an A.S. in Forestry and an A.S. in Resource Business Management from the University of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bygone Coastal Maine: A Postcard Tour from Kittery to Camden (2004)
  • Bygone Boston: A Postcard Tour of Beantown (2003)
  • Bygone Bar Harbor: A Postcard Tour of Mount Desert Island and Acadia National Park (2002)
  • An Adventure Guide to Maine (1999)
  • A Pocket Guide to Hiking on Mount Desert Island (1996; maps by Ruth Ann Hill)
  • A Pocket Guide to Paddling the Waters of Mount Desert Island (1996; maps by Ruth Ann Hill)
  • Bar Harbor Fire Department, 100 years of History, 1881-1981 (1981)
  • 12 Walks on Mount Desert Island
  • A Pocket Guide to Hiking on Mount Desert Island (2012)

Selected Resources

McGrail, Sarah (1969 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Sarah Sherman McGrail, who also has written under the name Sarah Sherman Brewer, was born on December 28, 1969 on Southport Island in mid-coast Maine, where she still lives. She has written two local histories of the Boothbay and Southport areas, a children's book, and two anthologies of the works of Maine writers and artists. Her book for children, The Littlest Tugboat, and Harbor Journal, Vol. I and Harbor Journal, Vol. II, were published by her own company, Cozy Harbor Press.

Selected Bibliography

  • Southport, the War Years: An Island Remembers (1996)
  • Heroes Among Us: A History of Boothbay Region's Veterans During the Second World War (1999)
  • The Littlest Tugboat (2005)
  • Harbor Journal, Vol. I: A New Collection of Writing and Images by 37 Imaginative Mainers (2006)
  • Harbor Journal, Vol. II: A Literary Sampler from Over 50 Maine Writers and Artists (2007)

Briggs, Kelly (1958 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Kelly Briggs, a children's book author and illustrator, was born in Rockland on Sept. 12, 1958 and raised in Camden, where she lives with her family. Her roots go deep: Briggs' great-great-grandfather, William Gill, was mayor of Camden in the late 1800s.

Selected Bibliography

  • Island Alphabet: An ABC of Maine Islands (1995)chosen by Yankee Magazine as one of its 100 classic New England children's books.
  • Lighthouse Lullabye (2001)

Brown, Margaret (1910 - 1952)

Genre: Children's Literature

Born in Brooklyn, NY, on May 23, 1910, Margaret Wise Brown, first as an editor and then as a writer, had a significant role in the creation of the twentieth-century picture book. A number of her books, such as Good Night Moon (1947) and The Runaway Bunny (1942), are considered children's classics.

Most of her dreamy and solitary childhood was lived in Whitestone Landing, Long Island, NY. Brown's family often spent their summer vacations in Maine. After graduating from Hollins College (VA) in 1932, Brown was a student in a Columbia University writers course. She then enrolled in a teacher program at the innovative Bank Street School. She quickly learned teaching was not what she wanted to do. She remained at the school, however, as a member of its publication staff. The school's 'here-and-now' philosophy, which focused on children's sensory experiences of the world, was a major influence on her writing.

In 1938 she became the editor for the newly created children's department of W.R. Scott publishers. She continued as editor until 1941 when she began her full-time writing career during which she published over 100 books.

Brown used three pseudonyms: Timothy Hay, playfully chosen for Horses (1947); Golden MacDonald (the name of an elderly Maine handyman Brown knew) used for all books published for Doubleday editor Margaret Lesser; and Juniper Sage (influenced by Junipero Serra's name) for her collaborations with Edith Thacher Hurd.

In 1943 Brown purchased a former quarry master's house on Vinalhaven Island, Maine, as a summer place where she entertained many writer and illustrator friends. In fact, a small island seen from her property was the inspiration for The Little Island (1946) for which Leonard Weisgard's illustrations received a Caldecott Medal.

On the day she was to be released from a Nice, France, hospital after a successful appendectomy, 13 Nov. 1952, she died unexpectedly from an embolism. Her ashes were brought to Maine and scattered in the ocean off Vinalhaven. A simple stone marker on her island property commemorates her life.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Children's Year (1937)
  • When the Wind Blew (1937)
  • The Noisy Book (1938)
  • Bumble Bugs and Elephants: A Big and Little Book (1938)
  • The Fish with the Deep Sea Smile (1938)
  • The Little Fireman (1938)
  • The Little Fisherman: A Fish Story (1938; illus. Dahlov Ipcar (q.v.)
  • The Log of Christopher Columbus' First Voyage to America in the Year 1492 (1938)
  • The Streamlined Pig (1938)
  • Homes in the Wilderness (1939)
  • Little Pig's Picnic, and Other Stories (1939)
  • The Noisy Book (1939)
  • The Comical Tragedy or Tragical Comedy of Punch & Judy (1940)
  • Country Noisy Book (1940)
  • The Fables of La Fontaine (1940)
  • Baby Animals (1941)
  • Brer Rabbit: Stories from Uncle Remus (1941)
  • The Polite Penguin (1941)
  • The Poodle and the Sheep (1941)
  • The Seashore Noisy Book (1941)
  • Don't Frighten the Lion! (1941)
  • Indoor Noisy Book (1942)
  • Night and Day (1942)
  • The Runaway Bunny(1942)
  • Big Dog, Little Dog (1943; written as Golden MacDonald)
  • A Child's Good Night Book (1943)
  • Little Chicken (1943)
  • The Noisy Bird Book (1943)
  • SHHhhhh...BANG: a whispering book (1943)
  • Animals, Plants and Machines (1943; written with Lucy Sprague Mitchell)
  • The Big Fur Secret (1944)
  • Black and White (1944)
  • Farm and City (1944; written with Lucy Sprague Mitchell)
  • Horses (1944; written as Timothy Hay)
  • Red Light Green Light (1944; written as Golden MacDonald)
  • They All Saw It (1944)
  • Willie's Walk to Grandmama (1944; written with Rockbridge Campbell)
  • The House of a Hundred Windows (1945)
  • Little Lost Lamb (1945; written as Golden MacDonald)
  • Little Fur Family (1946)
  • The Little Island (1946; written as Golden MacDonald)
  • The Man in the Manhole and the Fix-it Men (1946; written as Juniper Sage)
  • The Bad Little Duckhunter (1947)
  • The First Story (1947)
  • The Golden Egg Book (1947)
  • Goodnight Moon (1947)
  • The Sleepy Little Lion (1947)
  • The Winter Noisy Book (1947)
  • Five Little Firemen (1948; written with Edith Thacher Hurd)
  • The Golden Sleepy Book (1948)
  • The Little Farmer (1948)
  • Wait Till the Moon Is Full (1948)
  • Wonderful Story Book (1948)
  • The Color Kittens (1948)
  • The Important Book (1949)
  • The Little Cowboy (1949)
  • My World (1949)
  • A Pussycat's Christmas (1949)
  • Two Little Trains (1949)
  • The Dark Wood of the Golden Birds (1950)
  • The Dream Book: First Comes the Dream (1950)
  • The Little Fat Policeman (1950; written with Edith Thacher Hurd)
  • O, Said the Squirrel (1950)
  • The Peppermint Family (1950)
  • The Quiet Noisy Book (1950)
  • The Wonderful House (1950)
  • Fox Eyes (1951)
  • The Summer Noisy Book (1951)
  • The Train to Timbuctoo (1951)
  • Two Little Gardeners (1951; written with Edith Thacher Hurd)
  • A Child's Good Morning (1952)
  • Christmas in the Barn (1952)
  • Doctor Squash, The Doll Doctor (1952)
  • Mister Dog: The Dog Who Belonged to Himself (1952)
  • The Noon Balloon (1952)
  • Pussy Willow (1952)
  • Seven Little Postmen (1952; written with Edith Thacher Hurd)
  • Where Have You Been? (1952)

Posthumous titles

  • Another Important Book (1999), a picture book showing kids the important things about being ages 1-6
  • Robin's Room (2002, illus. Steve Johnson and Lou Fancher)
  • My World of Color (2002, illus. Loretta Krupinski)
  • Sailor Boy Jig (2002)
  • Sheep Don't Count Sheep (2003), about a lamb having trouble falling asleep until his mother tells him to count butterflies
  • Sneakers, the Seaside Cat (2003)
  • The Fierce Yellow Pumpkin (2003)
  • A Child is Born (2003; ill. Floyd Cooper; board book).
  • The Days Before Now: An Autobiographical Note by Margaret Wise Brown (1994)edited by Joan W. Blos

Selected Resources

Juvenile Titles

Browne, Charles (1834 - 1867)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Humorist/satirist Browne -- known popularly as Artemus Ward -- was born on April 26, 1834 in Waterford Flat, Maine, but lived most of his short life in Ohio, working as a columnist and writer for the Cleveland Plain Dealer. All of his writing was published under the name of Artemus Ward. Browne got to know Mark Twain while briefly, at a time when Browne was in his heyday and was able to offer encouragement to fellow-humorist Twain

Browne was the humorist and showman of his day, performing monologues on stage and writing books filled with comical misspellings. He lectured across the U.S. and overseas, dying of tuberculosis in Southampton, England, on Jan. 23, 1867 at the age of 33.

Selected Bibliography

  • Artmeus Ward, His Book (1862/1964)
  • Artemus Ward, His Travels (Pt I: Miscellaneous, Pt II: Among the Mormons) (1865/1981)
  • Artemus Ward Among the Fenians (1866)
  • Artemus Ward in London, and other papers (1867)
  • The Complete Works of Artemus Ward (1867/1970)
  • Artemus Ward's Panorama (as exhibited at the Egyptian Hall, London) (1869/1970, published by his executors; the British version was called Artemus Ward's Lecture (as delivered at the Egyptian Hall, London) and came out the same year)
  • Artemus Ward: Complete (1890)
  • Letters of Artemus Ward to Charles E. Wilson 1858-1861 (1900)
  • Artemus Ward's Best Stories (1912)
  • Selected Works of Artemus Ward (1924/1970)

Selected Resources

  • Artemus Ward (Charles Farrar Browne): A Biography and Bibliography, by Don Carlos Seitz (1919/1974)
  • Comic Relief: The Life and Laughter of Artemus Ward, by John Pullen (q.v.) (1983)
  • Papers may be found at the University of Virginia
  • Gutenberg Project text of all of the Artemus Ward books

Brox, Jane (1956 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Non-fiction writer Jane Brox (born Sept. 4, 1956) grew up on a farm in Dracut, Mass., in the Merrimack Valley. She received a B.A. in English Lit (1978) from Colby College and an M.F.A. in poetry from Warren Wilson College. Brox lived on Nantucket and in Cambridge, and eventually moved back to the farm to help her family with it and the farmstand.

For many years she taught creative writing at the Harvard Extension School in Cambridge; she now teaches in Lesley College's low-residency MFA program. She lives in Brunswick, ME.

She received a Massachusetts Cultural Council Fiction Grant and a literature fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts in 1994. Her essays appear in The American Scholar, the Boston Sunday Globe, CommonWealth, The Georgia Review, and the New England Review.

Selected Bibliography

  • Here and Nowhere Else: Late Seasons of a Farm and Its Family (1995), about her return to the family farm after years away. Winner of the 1996 Winship/PEN New England Award
  • Five Thousand Days Like This One: An American Family History (1999), a history of her family and generations who worked on the farm, using primary sources
  • Clearing Land: Legacies of an American Farm (2004), about 'local food issues, land usage, and the dying off of small family New England farms.'
  • Brilliant: the Evolution of Artificial Light (2010)
  • Silence: A Social History of one of the Least Understood Elements of Our Lives (2019)

Anthologies

  • Best American Essays
  • The Norton Book of Nature Writing
  • Pushcart Prize Anthology.

Selected Resources

  • A 2004 New York Times article about Brox is accompanied by a photo of her family's farmhouse.
  • Jessa Crispin at Bookslut interviewed Brox in Jan. 2005
  • A short essay by Brox is online at the Colby Magazine website.

Brunelle, Jim (1935 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

James E. 'Jim' Brunelle (born June 16, 1935) had an early career in radio journalism at New England, New York and Washington stations. In the mid 1960s he joined the Maine Broadcasting System radio and televisions stations as a statehouse reporter and political commentator. Four years later he became a print journalist for the Guy Gannett papers in Portland, Waterville, and Augusta. His reporting in both print and the media has earned him several news reporting awards. He lives in Cape Elizabeth, Maine.

In addition to his newspaper work, he has edited/written four books, all of which reflect his interest in Maine history and social culture.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Almanac (1978)
  • Over To Home And From Away: Best of Maine Humor (1981)
  • Maine Geographic Book Of Lists: Interesting And Unusual Facts About Maine (1983)
  • The Best Of New England Humor -- Or Pretty Darn Close (1990)

Bryan, Ashley (1923 - 2022)

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator, Poetry

Now a resident of Islesford on Little Cranberry Island off the coast of Maine (where he had summered since 1946) Bryan was born in the Bronx on 13 July 1923, a child of immigrants from the West Indies island of Antigua. He attended The Cooper Union Art School, where scholarships were awarded for talent and not determined by race, and after service in World War II, went on to earn a degree in philosophy from Columbia University and win a Fulbright Scholarship for art studies in Europe.

He taught art at Queens College-CUNY, Lafayette College, and Dartmouth College (1973-1985) before leaving academic life to concentrate full time on his own work.

In 2009, Bryan won the ALA Laura Ingalls Wilder Award, which "honors an author or illustrator whose books are published in the US and have made a substantial and lasting contribution to literature for children." In 2012 he won Coretta Scott King-Virginia Hamilton Award for lifetime achievement.

Bryan's books were first published in the 1960s, and since then he has illustrated more than thirty-five books, many of them texts he also wrote, retold, or selected. Among the honors his work has received are nine Coretta Scott King Awards and a Maine Lupine Award. He also received the May Hill Arbuthnot Honor Lecture Award given to an individual of distinction in the field of children's literature.

He also won the 2012 Coretta Scott King-Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement.

Bryan's books, as Kirkus Reviews observed, are meant "to be read aloud, with bits of rhyme and unexpected wordplay."

Selected Bibliography

  • Fabliaux: Ribald Tales from the Old French, For the First Time Done Into English (1965; by Robert Hellman and Richard O'Gorman; illus. Bryan)
  • Moon, For What Do You Wait? Poems by Tagore (1967; ed. Richard Lewis; illus. Bryan)
  • The Ox of the Wonderful Horns And Other African Folktales (1971/1993)
  • Walk Together Children: Black American Spirituals (1974; select./illus. Bryan). An ALA Notable Book.
  • Adventures of Aku: Or, How it Came About That We Shall Always See Okra the Cat Lying on a Velvet Cushion, While Okraman the Dog Sleeps Among the Ashes (1976; retold and illus. by Bryan)
  • The Dancing Granny (1977/1987)
  • I Greet the Dawn: Poems by Paul Laurence Dunbar (1978; select., illus., and intro. by Bryan)
  • Jethro and the Jumbie (1979; by Susan Cooper; illus. Bryan)
  • Jim Flying High (1979; by Mari Evans; illus. Bryan)
  • Beat the Story-Drum, Pum-Pum (1980/1999; retold and illus. by Bryan)
  • I'm Going To Sing: Black American Spirituals (1984; select/illus. Bryan)
  • The Cat's Purr (1985)
  • Lion and the Ostrich Chicks, and Other African Folk Tales (1986/1996)
  • What a Morning: The Christmas Story in Black Spirituals (1987/1996; select/ed. John Langstaff; illus. Bryan)
  • Sh-ko and His Eight Wicked Brothers (1988; retold by Bryan; illus. Fumio Yoshimura)
  • Turtle Knows Your Name (1989/1993; retold and illus. by Bryan)
  • Pourquoi Tales: The Cat's Purr, Why Frog and Snake Never Play Together, the Fire Bringer (1989; with Margaret Hodges)
  • Climbing Jacob's Ladder: Heroes of the Bible in African-American Spirituals (1991; selected. John Langstaff; illus. Bryan)
  • Sing to the Sun: Poems and Pictures (1992/1996)
  • Christmas Gif': An Anthology of Christmas Poems, Songs, and Stories Written by and about African-Americans (1993; compiler Charlemae Hill Rollins; illus. Bryan)
  • The Story of Lightning and Thunder (1993/1999)
  • Poems and Folktales (1994)
  • What a Wonderful World! (1995; lyrics by George David Weiss and Bob Thiele)
  • It's Kwanzaa Time! (1995; by Linda and Clay Goss; illus. Bryan)
  • The Story of the Three Kingdoms; by Walter Dean Myers (1995; illus. Bryan)
  • The Sun Is So Quiet: Poems by Nikki Giovanni (1996; illus. Bryan)
  • Ashley Bryan's ABC of African American Poetry (1997/2001)
  • Carol of the Brown King: Nativity Poems, by Langston Hughes (1998; illus. Bryan)
  • The House With No Door: African Riddle-Poems (1998; Bryan Swann, compiler; illus. Bryan)
  • Ashley Bryan's African Tales, Uh-Huh (1998)
  • Why Leopard Has Spots: Dan Stories from Liberia (1998; Won-Ldy Paye and Margaret H. Lippert, adapters; illus. Bryan)
  • The Night Has Ears: African proverbs (1999; selected and illus. Bryan)
  • All Night, All Day: A Child's First Book of African-American Spirituals (1991)
  • Aneesa Lee and the Weaver's Gift (1999; by Nikki Grimes; illus. by Bryan)
  • Jump Back, Honey: The Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar (1999; select./intro. Bryan and Andrea Davis Pinkney; illus. Bryan)
  • How God Fix Jonah (2000; by Lorenz Graham; illus. Bryan)
  • Salting the Ocean: 100 Poems by Young Poets (2000; selected by Naomi Shihab Nye; illus. Bryan)
  • Beautiful Blackbird (2003). Audio tape titled Ashley Bryan's Beautiful Blackbird And Other Folktales (2004).
  • A Nest Full of Stars (2005, written by James Berry, illus. Bryan)
  • Spirituals (2007)
  • My America (2007), a poem written by Jan Spivey Gilchrist, illus. Bryan
  • Who Built the Stable?: A Nativity Poem (2012)

Selected Resources

Bullard, Laura (1831 - 1912)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

The daughter of Jerimiah (Jeremiah?) and Lucy Curtis, Laura Jane Curtis Bullard was born on Nov. 21 1831 (1832?) in Freedom, Maine and also lived with her family in Bangor. Little is known about the Curtis family except that in the 1830s they started a company in Bangor to sell 'Mrs. Winslow's Soothing Syrup,' a morphine-based tonic used to soothe aches and pains; it became a popular patented medicine.

Laura married Enoch Bullard, a merchant. The Bullards lived in Brooklyn, New York, and had a son, Harold. Laura Bullard was a close associate of Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, the famous women's rights activists. Since Mrs. Stanton lived outside the city, Laura and her mother often provided hospitality in their Brooklyn home to visiting dignitaries in the women's rights movement.

Bullard was one of the founders of Sorosis, an early women's club, and was a leader of the Women's Bureau and The Working Women's Association, both of which focused on employment issues related to women.

In the 1850s Bullard published two novels whose purpose was to promote women's independence. Her novel, Christine, or Woman's Trials and Triumphs (1856), is, in the opinion of some, the first novel to promote every demand of the women's movement.

During the late 1860s and early 1870s, Bullard was associated with The Revolution, a weekly women's rights newspaper started by Susan B. Anthony, publisher and owner. Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Parker Pillsbury were editors. When the paper had financial difficulties in 1870, Anthony paid off the debt and transferred ownership to Bullard. Under her ownership, from 1870 to 1872, The Revolution became more of a literary paper. All issues of The Revolution are available on microfilm in The Maine Women Writers Collection at the University of New England. Bullard's biographical essay on Elizabeth Cady Stanton published in Our Famous Women (1884) can also be found in the Collection.

She died on Jan. 19, 1912.

Selected Bibliography

  • Now-A-Day (1854)
  • Christine, or Woman's Trials and Triumphs (1856)

Selected Resources

Burnham, Clara (1854 - 1927)

Genre: General Fiction

Born in Newton, Massachusetts, on June 20, 1854, and spending much of her life in Chicago, Burnham summered on Bailey Island (near Brunswick) and wrote stories about the region. Her father was the popular American song-writer George Frederick Root. Her works deal largely with the teachings of Christian Science.

She died in 1927.

Selected Bibliography

  • No Gentlemen (1881)
  • We, Von Arldens (1881, under a pseudonym, Edith Douglas)
  • A Sane Lunatic (1882)
  • Dearly Bought (1884)
  • Young Maids and Old (1889)
  • Mistress of Beech Knoll, a novel (1890)
  • Miss Bagg's Secretary: A West Point Romance (1892)
  • Phyllis, the Farmer's Daughter: an Operatic Cantata (1892), with her father George F. Root
  • Dr. Latimer; A Story of Casco Bay (1893)
  • Uncle Benjamin's Christmas Gift (1894)
  • Sweet Clover: A Romance of the White City (1894), about Chicago and the 1893 World's Fair;
  • The Wise Woman (1895)
  • Miss Archer Archer (1897)
  • A Great Love (1898)
  • A West Point Wooing, and Other Stories (1899; reprinted 1969)
  • Next Door (1900)
  • The Right Princess (1902)
  • Jewel: A Chapter in Her Life (1903), on which a 1923 movie of the smae name was based
  • Jewel's Story Book (1904)
  • The Opened Shutters (1906), about a summer romance on Casco Bay; two films, 1914 & 1921 were based on the book
  • The Leaven of Love (1908)
  • Quest Flower (1908)
  • Clever Betsy, a novel (1910)
  • Inner Flame, a novel (1912)
  • Right Track (1914)
  • Great Love (1915)
  • Instead of the Thorn (1916)
  • Hearts' Haven (1918), a 1921 film was based
  • Wenonah's Stories for Children (1918)
  • (1919)
  • Key note, a novel (1921)
  • Queen of Farrandale, a novel (1923)
  • Lavarons, a novel (1925)
  • Tobey's First Case, a novel (1926)

Selected resources

Clarey, Joanne (1941 - )

Genre: Mystery

Mystery and thriller writer Joanne Clarey grew up in Massachusetts and graduated from Colby College with a B.A. in English Literature (1962). She earned her M.Ed. and Ed.D. in clinical counseling and supervision from the University of Maine at Orono. She resided in Portland for many years, and lives in Maine and New Hampshire in the summer and in High Point, North Carolina in the winter.

Before she began writing for publication, she taught high school English, ran an antiques business, taught counseling and women's studies at the University of Southern Maine, and was a psychotherapist in private practice.

Selected Bibliography

Hummingbird Falls Series

  • The Mysteries of Hummingbird Falls (2005)
  • Riddled to Death (2006)

Dr. Christie McMorrow Series

  • Twisted Truth (2005)
  • Skinned (2007)

Selected Resources

Burroughs, Franklin (1942 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Bowdoinham resident Franklin Burroughs was born in Conway, South Carolina, on March 3, 1942. He received his B.A. from the University of the South (1964) and his M.A.(1965) and Ph.D (1970) from Harvard. He was a member of the Bowdoin College English Department faculty from 1968 to his retirement in the fall of 2000. He is a highly respected nature writer.

Selected Bibliography

  • Billy Watson's Croker Sack (1991/1998)
  • Horry and the Waccamaw, first published in 1992 and republished in 1998 as The River Home: A Return to the Carolina Low Country
  • Confluence: Merrymeeting Bay, (2006) with photography by Heather Perry.

Anthology Writings

  • 1987 and 1989 Best American Essays
  • The Pushcart Book of Essays: The Best Essays from a Quarter-Century of the Pushcart Prize (2002)
  • The Quotable Moose: A Contemporary Maine Reader (1994)
  • In Short: A Collection of Brief Creative Nonfiction (1996)
  • American Nature Writing 1999
  • The Woods Stretched for Miles: New Nature Writing from the South (1999)
  • Nature Writing: The Tradition in English (2002)
  • On Wilderness: Voices from Maine (2003).

Butler, Joyce (1933 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Joyce Butler, born on June 27, 1933 in Portland, Maine, is a Kennebunk resident and an historian, archivist/curator, and writer.

She received an associate degree from Westbrook Junior College (now the University of New England) in 1953 and an A.B. from Boston University in 1955.

She was the Kennebunkport Historical Society archivist from 1975-1979. Her next position, 1979-1995, was exhibit and manuscript curator at the Brick Store Museum, Kennebunk. More recently she curated exhibits at the Center for Maine History.

In 1990 Butler was appointed the town historian for Kennebunk. She is also well-known in the historical society/museum world as a lecturer and consultant on manuscript preservation and cataloging.

In addition to the books listed below, Joyce Butler's writing has been published in magazines/newspapers such as Chapters in Local History, Christian Science Monitor, Down East, Maine Life, Landmarks Observer, Log of Mystic Seaport, and Magazine Antiques.

Selected Bibliography

  • Wildfire Loose" The Week Maine Burned, (1978/79) included in the Mirror of Maine list of 100 significant Maine books.
  • The South Congregational Church: An Architectural History (1973)
  • Pages from a Journal (1976)
  • Kennebunkport Scrapbook (1977)
  • Abbott Fuller Graves, 1859-1936 (1979)
  • The Kennebunks: A Watering Place, the First Fifty Years, 1870-1920 (1980)
  • Louis D. Norton, 1868-1940 (1982)
  • The Artist as Historian: Augustus W. Buhler, 1853-1920 (1983)
  • A Kennebunkport Album (1984)
  • The Duchess Who Lived in the Mansion (1986)
  • Spirits in the Wood (1997)

Anthologies

  • Tilt; An Anthology of New England Women's Writing and Art (1978)
  • Tales of Whales (1982)
  • Ladies Choice (1982)
  • Agreeable Situations: Society, Commerce, and Art in Southern Maine, 1780-1830 (1987, edited by Laura Fecych Sprague)
  • Maine in the Early Republic (1988)

Selected Resources

Buzzeo, Toni (1951 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Toni Buzzeo was born (October 4, 1951) and raised in Dearborn, Michigan, moving to Maine in 1979. She lives in a colonial farmhouse in Buxton, Maine.

Buzzeo earned a B.A. and an M.A. in English Language and Literature from the University of Michigan and an MLIS in Library and Information Science from the University of Rhode Island.

She is a former Library Media Specialist, and was chosen Maine Library Media Specialist of the Year in 1999. Previously, she worked as a children's librarian at the Baxter Memorial Library in Gorham, Maine and as a high school and college English teacher.

Selected Bibliography

Children's Books

  • The Sea Chest (2002) ill. Mary GrandPre, winner of a Maine Library Association Lupine Honor Award, an Oppenheim Toy Portfolio Gold Award, and the 2004-05 Children's Crown Gallery Award; named one of four recommended titles in the Time Of Wonder Award selection; chosen as one of the Best Children's Books of the Year, 2002, by The Children's Book Committee at Bank Street College.
  • Dawdle Duckling (2003) ill. Margaret Spengler, a Children's Book-of-the-Month Club selection and a Dolly Parton Imagination Library selection.
  • Little Loon and Papa (2004) ill. Margaret Spengler), a Brodart top juvenile title and a Dolly Parton Imagination Library selection.
  • Ready or Not, Dawdle Duckling (2005) ill. Margaret Spengler
  • Our Librarian Won't Tell Us ANYTHING (2006) illus. Sachiko Yoshikawa, first in the Mrs. Skorupski, librarian, series.
  • The Library Doors (2008, illus. Nadine Westcott)
  • No T. Rex in the Library (2010) illus. Sachiko Yoshikawa
  • A Lighthouse Christmas (2010) illus. Nancy Carpenter, winner 2012 Time of Wonder Award
  • Just Like My Papa (2013) illus. by Mike Wohnoutka
  • But I Read it on the Internet! (2013) illus. by Sachiki Yoshikawa
  • Stay Close to Mama (2012) illus. by Mike Wohnoutka
  • One Cool Friend (2012) pictures by David Small winner, Maine Literary Awards award for Children's Books, 2013 Caldecott Honor Book
  • Inside the Books: Readers and Libraries Around the World (2012) illus. by Jude Daly
  • My Bibi Always Remembers (2014)

Professional Books

  • Terrific Connections with Authors, Illustrators, and Storytellers: Real Space and Virtual Links (1999)with Jane Kurtz
  • 35 Best Books For Teaching U.S. Regions(2002)
  • Toni Buzzeo and YOU (2005), to help teachers teach from Buzzeo's books
  • Collaborating to Meet Standards: Teacher/Librarian Partnerships for K-6 (2007, 2nd ed.)
  • ABC Read to Me: Teaching Letter of the Week in the Library (2009)

Selected Resources

Martin, Jacqueline (1945 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Award-winning children's author Jackie Martin was born in Lewiston and grew up in Turner, Maine, where her parents had a dairy farm. She lives in the college town of Mt. Vernon, Iowa, with her husband. They summer in Maine, where she still has family.

She received her B.A. from Wellesley College (1966) and an M.A. in child development (1971) from the University of Minnesota.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bizzy Bones and Uncle Ezra, (1984)
  • Bizzy Bones and Moosemouse, (1986)
  • Bizzy Bones and the Lost Quilt, (1988)
  • The Finest Horse in Town, (1992/2003)
  • Good Times on Grandfather Mountain, (1992)
  • Washing the Willow Tree Loon, (1995)
  • The Second Street Gardens and the Green Truck Almanac, (1995)
  • Grandmother Bryant's Pocket, (1996) (Lupine Award winner)
  • The Green Truck Garden Giveaway: A Neighborhood Story and Almanac, (1997)
  • Higgins Bend Song and Dance, (1997)
  • Button, Bucket, Sky, (1998)
  • Snowflake Bentley, (1998) (Caldecott Medal and Lupine Award winner)
  • The Lamp, the Ice and the Boat Called Fish, (2001)
  • On Sand Island, (2003)
  • The Water Gift and the Pig of the Pig, (2003) (Lupine Award winner)
  • Banjo Granny, (2006)
  • Chicken Joy on Redbean Road: A Bayou Country Romp, (2007)

Selected Links

Smith, Seba (1792 - 1868)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Seba Smith was born in the log cabin his father built in Buckfield, Maine, then the frontier, on September 14, 1792. He lived in Bridgton, Boothbay Harbor and Portland before moving with his wife to New York City around 1840. Prior to the Civil War, he was a very successful and popular political satirist writing under the pen name of Major Jack Downing. Major Downing, supposedly a close friend of Andrew Jackson, satirized Washington politics, including nationalism and the concept of Manifest Destiny.

An 1818 graduate of Bowdoin College, Smith was a journalist and newspaper publisher in Portland from 1820-1838, associated with The Daily Courier (1929-), The Family Reader (1829-1832?), The Eastern Argus, and the Downing Gazette (1834-36). After relocating to New York City in 1839, Smith wrote for Emerson's United States Magazine (aka Emerson's Magazine and Putnam's Monthly, 1854, and The Great Republic, 1859).

Much of what Smith wrote was in verse, but some argue that he probably felt that his masterpiece was a mathematical work on which he spent the last days of his life. He died on July 29, 1868 in Patchogue, Long Island, NY. Gale's Dictionary of Literary Biography (Volume 243: The American Renaissance in New England, Fourth Series, 2001) has an extensive section on Smith.

Smith's wife, Elizabeth Oakes Smith, was also a writer, and sometimes used the pen name of Ernest Helfenstein.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Life and Writings of Major Jack Downing of Downingville, Away Down East in the State of Maine, by Himself (1833)
  • John Smith's Letters, with 'picters' to match. Containing Reasons Why John Smith Should Not Change His Name; Miss Debby Smith's Juvenile Spirit; Together with the Only Authentic History Extant of the Late War in Our Disputed Territory (1839)
  • Powhatan: A Metrical Romance, in Seven Cantos (1841)
  • May-Day in New York; or, House-Hunting and Moving; Illustrated and Explained in Letters to Aunt Keziah. By Major Jack Downing (1845; republished as Jack Downing's Letters by Major Jack Downing in 1859)
  • Dew-Drops of the Nineteenth Century: Gathered and Preserved in Their Brightness and Purity (1845), edited, with contributions, by Seba Smith and Elizabeth Oakes Smith
  • New Elements of Geometry (1850), 'an ingenious but paradoxical attempt to overturn the common definitions of geometry'
  • Way Down East, or, Portraitures of Yankee Life (1854/1969)
  • My Thirty Years Out of the Senate (1859)

Charles Augustus Davis was a well-known imitator of Smith, writing and publishing his own Jack Downing letters in the New York Daily Advertiser beginning in July 1833. His letters were more anti-Jackson than Smith's, and not as humourous, but were more attuned to the details of current political events. Davis published a book in 1834 titled Letters of J. Downing.

Snow, Charles (1884 - 1977)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Poet, educator, and politician Wilbert Snow, as he was commonly known, was born April 6, 1884 on White Head Island, St. George, Maine. Although he loved and valued the Maine coast, returned to it regularly, and made it almost the sole focus of his poetry, Wilbert Snow knew from a young age that he would leave it.

Snow graduated from Bowdoin College in 1907 and from Columbia University in 1910 with a Master of Arts degree. With the exception of the time he spent in Alaska as a teacher and reindeer agent (1911-1912), and his service as a U.S. Army artillery captain during World War I, Snow's primary career was teaching English at a number of schools including (among others) Bowdoin College (his alma mater), Williams College and Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut where he began a 31-year teaching career in 1921. During his last year of teaching, he was also a U.S. State Department lecturer in Europe and Asia. Upon his retirement from Wesleyan in 1952 he was honored with the title of Professor Emeritus.

Snow had an intense interest in politics and the highlight of his political career was his election as Connecticut's Lieutenant Governor in 1945-1946. He also served as Governor for 12 days in 1947 when the then-governor, Raymond Baldwin, resigned before the end of his term to become a U.S. Senator.

White Head Island, Snow's birthplace, always remained a special place for him. His son, Nicholas Snow, published a brief and touching remembrance of his father's last visit to the island in mid-summer 1977 entitled 'Snow on Snow,' which appeared in the 1989 Island Journal, the annual publication of the Island Institute. Snow died on September 28, 1997 at Spruce Island, Maine, his summer home.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Coast (1923)
  • Inner Harbor: More Maine Coast poems (1926)
  • Down East (1932)
  • Selected Poems (1936)
  • Before the Wind (1938)
  • Maine Tides (1940)
  • Sonnets to Steve, and Other Poems (1957)
  • Spruce Head: Selections from the Poetry of Wilbert Snow (1958)
  • The Collected Poems of Wilbert Snow (1963, 1973, 2nd ed.)
  • His autobiography, Codline's Child, was published in 1973.

Selected Links

  • Biographical information and a small collection of letters Snow wrote to Homer Woodbridge, a fellow Wesleyan professor, can be found at the Delaware University Library

Snyder, Donald (1950 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Don Snyder, a resident of Scarborough, Maine and New Brunswick, Canada, was born in Hatfield, Pennsylvania, on August 11, 1950. He was one of twins and his mother died days later of complications from the pregnancy.

He was raised in Bangor, Maine, graduated from Colby College in 1972, and worked as editor of the Bar Harbor Times, as reporter for a Portland weekly, and as a freelance writer.

After achieving his dream of participating in the University of Iowa Writers' Workshop, he taught briefly at Colby, the University of Maine at Orono and Colgate University in Hamilton, New York. In 1992, after failing to get tenure at Colgate, he and his family moved back to Maine where and he took jobs as a greenskeeper, construction laborer, house painter, and cottage caretaker for summer people.

His big break came in 1995 with the publication in Harper's magazine of an excerpt from his journal, which became the book, The Cliff Walk: A Memoir of a Job Lost and a Life Found, published in 1997. In addition to writing memoirs and novels, Snyder also teaches screenwriting, fiction writing and nonfiction prose in the MFA program at Western Connecticut University.

Selected Bibliography

Memoirs

  • The Cliff Walk: A Memoir of a Job Lost and a Life Found (1997), recounts the story of his life's unraveling after he lost his teaching job at Colgate
  • Of Time and Memory: A Mother's Story (1999), recounts his mother's life, his parents' courtship, and the mystery surrounding her death. The New York Times reviewed both Cliff Walk and Of Time and Memory
  • Walking with Jack: A Father's Journey to Become His Son's Caddie (2013)

Books

  • A Soldier's Disgrace (1987)
  • Veterans Park (1987)
  • From the Point (1988)
  • Fallen Angel (2001), which became a Hallmark Hall of Fame movie
  • Night Crossing (2001)
  • Winter Dreams (2004)

Selected Resources

A profile of Don Snyder appeared in the Boston Globe in 1999.

Spark, Debra (1962 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Debra Spark was born in Massachusetts on June 17, 1962, graduated from Yale University in 1984, and received a MFA in fiction writing from the University of Iowa Writers' Workshop in 1986. She now lives in North Yarmouth, Maine and is a professor of English at Colby College in Waterville, Maine where she has also been a director of its creative writing program. Spark is also an instructor in the MFA Program at Warren Wilson College, and she's lectured in writing at Tufts University, Emerson College, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, among other schools.

Spark's work has appeared in Ploughshares, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Yankee, Food and Wine, Down East, and other publications. Her essay, 'Last Things,' about her younger sister's death from breast cancer, is included in the book Sorrow's Company: Writers on Loss and Grief (ed. DeWitt Henry, 2001).

Selected Bibliography

  • Curious Attractions: Essays on Writing (2005): nine essays on fiction writing
  • The Ghost of Bridgetown (2001)
  • Coconuts for the Saint (novel, 1994/1996)
  • On the Tail of the Dog Star (short stories, 1990)
  • 20 Under 30: Best Stories by America's New Young Writers (1986), which was reissued as 20 Under 30: Early Works from Today's Influential Writers, editor (1996)
  • The Pretty Girl: Novella and Stories (2012)
  • And Then Something Happened: Essays on Fiction Writing (2020)

Selected Resources

  • Gale's Contemporary Authors Online, 2002

Selected Links

Spencer-Fleming, Julia (1961 - )

Genre: Mystery

Julia Spencer-Fleming lives in Buxton, Maine with her family. Raised in a military family, she was born on June 26, 1961 at Plattsburgh Air Force Base in New York and spent most of her childhood moving from place to place. She studied acting and history at Ithaca College, received her JD from the University of Maine School of Law, and has worked full-time as a Portland, Maine-area attorney.

Spencer-Fleming's mystery novels are set in the small upstate New York town of Miller Kills and all feature ordained Episcopal priest and ex-Army helicopter pilot Clare Fergusson and police chief Russ Van Alstyne. Her debut novel, In the Bleak Midwinter (2002), won the 2001 Malice Domestic Award for Best First Traditional Mystery, the 2003 Anthony Award for Best First Novel, as well as the Dilys, the Barry and the Macavity Awards, making her the first author to win all six awards for a first novel.

Bibliography

  • In the Bleak Midwinter
  • A Fountain Filled With Blood, (2003)
  • Out of the Deep I Cry (2004
  • To Darkness and To Death (2005)
  • All Mortal Flesh, (2006)
  • I Shall Not Want (2008)
  • One Was a Soldier (2011)
  • Through the Evil Days (2013)
  • Hid From Our Eyes (2020)

Selected Links

Spofford, Harriet (1835 - 1921)

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery, Poetry, Romance Novel, Science Fiction/Fantasy

Harriet Prescott Spofford, born on April 3, 1835 in Calais, Maine, was a well-known writer of detective stories, science fiction, and romance tales. Her first major magazine sale, a detective story called 'In the Cellar' (1859), was to the Atlantic Monthly. Some of her stories are included in The Amber Gods and Other Stories, which was re-published in 1989, and edited by Alfred Bendixen. There is an entry on Spofford in Famous American Women: A Biographical Dictionary from Colonial Times to the Present (ed. Robert McHenry, 1983).

Spofford married Newburyport lawyer Richard S. Spofford in 1865 and lived most of her adult life in Newburyport and Amesbury, Massachusetts. She died on August 14, 1921.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sir Rohan's Ghost: A Romance (1860; published anonymously)
  • The Amber Gods and Other Stories (1863)
  • Azarian: An Episode (1864)
  • New-England Legends (1871)
  • Art Decoration Applied to Furniture (1878)
  • Poems (1882)
  • The Marquis of Carabas (1882)
  • Hester Stanley at Saint Marks (1883; novel)
  • Ballads About Authors (1887)
  • Hymn, for the One Hundredth Anniversary of the Birth of Sarah Balch Braman (1890)
  • A Lost Jewel (1891)
  • A Scarlet Poppy, and Other Stories (1894/1969)
  • Three Heroines of New England Romance: Their True Stories Herein Set Forth (1894; with Louise I. Guiney and Alice Brown)
  • A Master Spirit (1896)
  • In Titian's Gardens, and Other Poems (1897)
  • Hester Stanley's Friends (1898)
  • Priscilla's Love-Story (1898)
  • The Maid He Married (1899)
  • Old Madame: And Other Tragedies (1900)
  • The Children of the Valley (1901)
  • The Great Procession (1902)
  • That Betty (1903)
  • Old Washington (1906)
  • The Fairy Changeling (1910)
  • The Making of a Fortune: A Romance (1911)
  • A Little Book of Friends (1916; essays)
  • The Elder's People (1920/1970; stories)
  • The Servant Girl Question (1977)

Selected Resources

Stephens, Ann (1810 - 1886)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry, Romance Novel, Short Stories

Ann Stephens, one of the most widely read 19th-century American writers, was born in Humphreysville, Connecticut on March 30, 1810. In 1831 she married Edward Stephens and moved to Portland, Maine. Three years later they began publishing Portland Magazine. Edward was the publisher and Ann, the editor/writer. More information about Ann's responsibilities can be found in Gwen Thompson's article 'Ann S. Stephens and the First Portland Magazine,' which was printed in the September 1994 issue of the current Portland Magazine. In 1836 Ann published her first book, The Portland Sketch Book, a collection of local writers' works.

In 1837 the Stephens moved to New York City where Ann began her long career as a magazine writer and editor. She was associated with Ladies' Companion, Graham's Magazine, and Peterson's Magazine.

In 1856, Stephens started her own magazine, Mrs. Stephens' Illustrated New Monthly; two years later it merged with Peterson's. Stephens wrote mostly historical and romantic melodramas that first appeared in serial form in the above magazines and other popular women's publications. Many of the stories were then published in book form.

Stephens met Edgar Allan Poe, editor of Graham's Magazine, when she was on that magazine's staff in 1841 and 1842. Poe later mentioned her and her work in The Literati of New York City, a series published in Godey's Lady's Book in 1846.

Stephens was the author of the first dime novel Beadle & Adams Company published when the company reissued her 1839 serial, Malaeska: The Indian Wife of the White Hunter (1860) in book form. It is reported to have sold over 300,000 copies. Stephens, like Elizabeth Oakes Smith, became one of the publisher's stable of writers. In addition to her novels and short stories, Stephens also wrote verse and literary reviews.

Stephens used the pseudonym 'Jonathan Slick' when she wrote a series of sketches focusing on an imaginary Yankee's experience in New York City. Edward Stephens published them under the title High Life in New York. By Jonathan Slick, Esq. of Weathersfield, Connecticut. A Series of Letters to Mr. Zephariah Slick, Justice of the Peace, and Deacon of the Church over to Weathersfield, in the State of Connecticut. (1843).

Stephens died on August 20, 1886.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Tradesman's Boast (1846)
  • The Ladies' Complete Guide to Crochet, Fancy Knitting and Needlework (1854)
  • Fashion and Famine (1854/1886)
  • The Reigning Belle. A Society Novel. (1855)
  • The Old Homestead (1855)
  • Mary Derwent (1858)
  • The Heiress. An Autobiography (1859)
  • Myra, The Child of Adoption (1860)
  • The Rejected Wife (1863/1876)
  • Ahmo's Plot; or, The Governor's Indian Child (1863?).
  • The Wife's Secret (1864/1876)
  • The Indian Queen (1864)
  • The Gold Brick (1866)
  • The Soldier's Orphans [1866]
  • The Curse of Gold (1869)
  • Ruby Gray's Strategy (1869)
  • Wives and Widows: or The Broken Life (1869)
  • Married in Haste (1870)
  • A Noble Woman (1871)
  • Palaces and Prisons (1871)
  • The Old Countess (1873)
  • Bellehood and Bondage (1873)
  • Lord Hope's Choice (1873)
  • Phemie Frost's Experiences (1874)
  • Bertha's Engagement (1875)
  • Norston's Rest (1877)
  • David Hunt (1892)
  • The Lady Mary (1892)
  • Wives and Widows; or, The Broken Life (1897)

Selected Resources

  • Women Vernacular Humorists in Nineteenth-Century America: Ann Stephens, Francis [i.e. Frances] Whitcher, and Marietta Holley (1988)
  • Hired Pens: Professional Writers in America's Golden Age of Print (1997).

Stephens, M.D., Charles (1844 - 1931)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories, Young Adult

Stephens was born on October 21, 1844 on a farm on Upton Ridge, Norway, Maine, graduated from Bowdoin College in 1869 and taught at the Norway Liberal Institute. In 1871 he married Christine Newell Stephens, who worked as a teacher, club-woman and writer of short stories for various juvenile publications. Stephens' second wife, Minne Plummer, was a well-known opera singer (Madame Scalar). Stephens died on September 22, 1931 in Norway, Maine.

Stephens' writing career began when he had stories about his early years published in a magazine called Our Young Folks; eventually, Stephens published over 25 articles in this magazine. When he began writing for a living, he changed his surname from Stevens to Stephens, so as not to embarrass his family should he fail. After several years of publishing articles and stories in various magazines, Stephens found a home for himself at The Youth's Companion in 1871, where he eventually became assistant editor and worked for 60 years as traveling correspondent. To facilitate writing accurate medical columns in Youth's Companion, Stephens pursued and received his Doctor of Medicine from Boston University in 1887, and later built a biological laboratory in his Norway home, a mansion near Lake Penneseewassee, across from where the entrance to Norway Lake Park is today.

Stephens published over 2,500 articles and 30 books, many set in the rural Maine of the mid-nineteenth century. Often his articles were published anonymously or using pseudonyms, including Zu Behfel, Stinson Jarvis, Marcus Vanderpool, Henrietta Crosby, Charlotte H. Smith, and Charles Adams (who wrote tales about 'Waynor' Maine).

The Friends of C.A. Stephens was established in 1994 (the 150th anniversary of his birth) and has each year since then has had a book of Stephens' re-published. The group has also bought a 20-acre parcel of land located off the Greenwood Road in Norway, believed to be Stephens' childhood playground, the Tom's Fort location mentioned in his writing.

Selected Bibliography

  • Camping Out series
    • Camping Out: As Recorded by 'Kit' (1872)
    • Left on Labrador; or, the Cruise of the Schooner-Yacht 'Curlew,' as recorded by 'Wash' (1872)
    • Off to the Geysers; or, the Young Yachters in Iceland (1872)
    • Lynx Hunting: From Notes (1873)
    • Fox-hunting: As Recorded by Raed (1873)
    • On the Amazon, or, The Cruise of 'the Rambler' (1873)
  • The Knockabout Club series
    • The Knockabout Club in the woods: The adventures of six young men in the wilds of Maine and Canada (1881)
    • The Knockabout club alongshore: The adventures of a party of young men on a trip from Boston to the land of the midnight sun (1882)
    • The Knockabout club in the tropics: The adventures of a party of young men in New Mexico, Mexico, and Central America (1883)
  • The Young Moose Hunters: A Backwoods-Boy's Story (1882/1926)
  • Living matter: Its Cycle of Growth and Decline in Animal Organisms (1888)
  • Pluri-cellular man: Whence and What is the Intellect, or 'Soul' What Becomes of the Soul? Is it Possible to Save the Soul? From the Biological Standpoint (1892)
  • Long life: The Occasional Review of an Investigation of the Intimate Causes of Old Age and Organic Death, with a Design to Their Alleviation and Removal (1896; and reprinted thereafter as author determined)
  • The Nation's Responsibility for its Laborers on the Panama Canal: Notes of a Visit to the Isthmus During the Winter and Spring of 1904 (1904)
  • Natural salvation: The Message of Science; Outlining the First Principles of Immortal Life on the Earth (1906; and variously repubished -- 1907, 1909, 1913 -- after this, sometimes as Salvation by Science, often with subheading including 'the Evolution of the Human Brain and the Growth of Human Knowledge')
  • Pioneer Boys Afloat on the Mississippi : a Story of Louisiana Purchase Times (1907; also published as The Ark of 1803 )
  • Immortal Life: How It Will Be Achieved (1920)
  • The Old Squire series
    • When Life was Young at the Old Farm (1912; republished as The Fields are Adventure in 1985)
    • Haps and Mishaps at the Old Farm (1912)
    • A Great Year of Our Lives at the Old Squire's (1912)
    • A Busy Year at the Old Squire's (1922)
    • Molly's Baby; A Little Heroine of the Seas (1924)
  • Andros Island: Walter Wainwright: And The Strangest of Wedding Journeys (1923)
  • Stories of My Home Folks (1926)
  • Katahdin Camps (1928/1929)
  • My Folks in Maine (1934)
  • A Wildwood Romance (1935)
  • Grandfather's Broadaxe, and Other Stories of a Maine Farm Family (1967; reprints)
  • Under the Sea in the Salvador (1969; reprints of short stories)
  • C. A. Stephens looks at Norway (1970; reprints of short stories originally published in the Youth's Companion between 1874-1920;
  • Charles Adams tales (1973; compiled by Louise Harris; stories involving adventure in the wild, animals, and ghosts, reprinted from Youth's Companion)
  • Little Big-Heart and other stories (1974; comp. by Louise Harris)
  • Stories from the Old Squire's Farm (1985/1995; compiled and edited by Charles G. Waugh and Eric-Jon Waugh
  • The Jonah (1995; an illustrated publication of Stephens' most famous short-story, 'When Hannibal Hamlin Ate the Fried Pies')
  • Sailing on the Ice: And Other Stories from the Old Squire's Farm (1996; compiled and edited by Charles G. Waugh and Larry Glatz).

Selected Resources

  • The World of C.A. Stephens by Ronald G. Whitney (1976/1996).
  • Comprehensive Bibliography of C.A. Stephens (1965)by Louise Harris
  • Star of the Youth's Companion by Louise Harris (1969; an annotated chronological listing of his stories).
  • Bowdoin College's Library Special Collections and Archives has biographical information on Stephens and a description of 2,350 manuscripts and drafts of Stephens' books, speeches, and articles, in Bowdoin's archival collection.

Stevens, C. J. (1927 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Although he has travelled extensively and lived in Portugal, Ireland, England, Holland, and Malta, Clysle Julius Stevens (aka John Stevens Wade) is a native Mainer, born December 8, 1927 in Smithfield where he currently resides. He graduated from Connecticut State Teachers College in 1953. Stevens has published over 500 stories, poems, textbook articles, translations, and books on a variety of topics during his extensive writing career.

Selected Bibliography

  • Lawrence at Tregerthen (1988; biographical, about DH Lawrence)
  • The Next Bend in the River (1989; about gold in Maine)
  • One Day with a Goat Herd (1992; about goat herding)
  • Maine Mining Adventures (1994)
  • The Cornish Nightmare (1996; DH Lawrence and the War years)
  • The Buried Treasures of Maine (1997)
  • Storyteller: The Life of Erskine Caldwell (2000)
  • The Supernatural Side of Maine (2002)
  • The Miracle of Bryan Pearce (2004)
  • Memoirs of a Maine Gold Hunter (2005)
  • Poetry and Stories
  • Loose Stones: First Poems (1954), under the name Clysle Stevens
  • Climbs of Uncertainty (1961)
  • Two from Where It Snows, Northeast Chapbook Series (1964, with John Judson)
  • Drowning in The Dark (1965)
  • Small World (1966, literary cartoons)
  • Poems from the Lowlands (1967, translator from the Dutch and Flemish)
  • Gallery, Poet & Printer (1969)
  • The Cats in the Colosseum (1973)
  • Well Water and Daisies (1974)
  • Each to His Own Ground (1976)
  • Waterland: A Gathering from Holland (1977, translator from the Dutch)
  • Some of My Best Friends Are Trees, (1978)
  • Homecoming (1979)
  • Up North (1980)
  • From the Flemish of Gaston Burssens (1982, translator)
  • Beginnings and Other Poems (1989)
  • Circling at the Chain's Length: Poems (1991)
  • The Folks from Greeley's Mill and Other Maine Stories (1992)
  • Hang-Ups: Poems (1993)
  • Selected Poems (1995)
  • Confessions: New and Selected Stories (1998)
  • Poems from Holland and Belgium (1999; collected and translated by Stevens)
  • Shepherd Without Sheep (2001)
  • Collected Poems (2003)

Selected Resources

Detailed descriptions of some of his books and a photo of Stevens are found on his website.

Stinnett, Caskie (1911 - 1998)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Born in Remington, Virginia on August 25, 1911, but 'a Mainer by inclination,' Stinnett wrote the monthly 'Room with a View' column in Down East magazine for 26 years, reflecting on Maine life and his own life lived on a private island -- Hamloaf Island -- in Casco Bay, near Brunswick. Stinnett was the founding editor of Travel and Leisure magazine, editor of Holiday magazine (editor-in-chief, 1967-1970), and a past president of the Society of American Travel Writers.

He also wrote pieces for The Atlantic Monthly, Realities, and The Saturday Evening Post. Prior to his writing career, he was a reporter with the News-Leader in Staunton, Virginia from 1932 to 1936, and an information specialist for the U.S. government from 1936 to 1945. He worked for Curtis Publishing Company from 1945 to 1962.

Selected Bibliography

  • Will Not Run February 22nd. (1956)
  • Out of the Red (1960)
  • Back to Abnormal (1963)
  • Grand and Private Pleasures (1977),
  • One Man's Island (1984; collections of 'Room with a View' columns)
  • Slightly Offshore: More Reflections on Contemporary Life from a Small Maine Island (1992; more 'Room with a View' columns, illustrated by Chris Van Dusen)

Stinnett wrote the preface for Herman Silverman's Michener and Me: A Memoir (1999) and the introduction to Fodor's New England (1978). He died November 5, 1998 at home in Wayne, Pennsylvania; a private memorial service took place on his Maine island.

Stover, Candice (1951 - )

Genre: Poetry

Candice Stover, born June 6, 1951, is a Maine native who lives in Somesville on Mount Desert Island, She received a B.A. from Northeastern University in 1974 and a M.S. from Pennsylvania State University in 1976. Stover is currently an adjunct faculty member at the College of the Atlantic and previously taught at Antioch University, the Seattle Academy of the Arts and Sciences, the University of New Hampshire, and Phillips Exeter Academy.

Other poems have been published in The Beloit Poetry Journal, Hope magazine, the Puckerbush Review, and The Christian Science Monitor, among others, as well as in The Other Side of Sorrow: Poets Speak Out About Conflict, War, and Peace (2006) and Sailing Maine (2007). Stover has worked as a reporter for the Boston Globe, has travelled extensively and taught in New Zealand and China, and designs writing workshops.

Selected Bibliography

  • Holding Patterns, won the Maine Chapbook Award in 1994
  • Another Stopping Place (2002), is a collection of travel-inspired poems focusing on the art of paying attention.
  • Walking to Windward,

Stowe, Harriet Beecher (1811 - 1896)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Best known for her first novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852) which was an immediate sensation, fanning the pro- and anti-slavery flames that eventually gave rise to the Civil War. Stowe was born in Litchfield, Connecticut on June 14, 1811, and grew up in a family that prized education and morality. Her father Lyman and several of her brothers were well-known preachers. She taught at her sister Catharine's school from 1827 to 1832, and then at Western Female Institute in Cincinnati (also founded by Catharine). Harriet married Calvin E. Stowe in 1836 when he was a professor at Lane Theological Seminary in Cincinnati. She wrote stories and sketches to earn money after they were married, and in 1850 the Stowes moved to Brunswick, Maine after her husband was appointed Professor of Natural and Revealed Religion at Bowdoin College. This is where she wrote Uncle Tom's Cabin, first published serially in National Era (1851-1852), and The Pearl. The Stowes lived in Andover, Massachusetts from 1853 to 1864, and then in Hartford, Connecticut. After her husband died in 1866, Stowe remained in Hartford, raising their seven children and traveling widely in the United States and abroad. She died on July 1, 1896.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Gift, a Christmas and New Year's present for 1840 (1839; with Eliza Leslie and Deacon Enos)
  • The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings
  • Uncle Tom's Cabin, or, Life Among the Lowly (1852)
  • History of the Edmonson Family (1852)
  • A Key To Uncle Tom's Cabin; Presenting the Original Facts and Documents Upon Which the Story is Founded Together with Corroborative Statements Verifying the Truth of the Work (1853), with documentary evidence to support her claims concerning slavery
  • Four Ways of Observing the Sabbath: Sketches from the Note Book of an Elderly Gentleman (1853)
  • Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands (1854), an account of her travels
  • First Geography for Children (1855)
  • The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings (1855)
  • Dred: A Tale of the Great Dismal Swamp (1856), an anti-slavery novel
  • Elisabeth of the Wartburg (1856)
  • Our Charley and What to do with him (1858)
  • The Minister's Wooing (1859)
  • The Pearl of Orr's Island (1862)
  • Agnes of Sorrento (1862)
  • The Ravages of a Carpet (1864)
  • House and Home Papers (1864)
  • The Chimney-Corner (1865)
  • Little Foxes; or, The Little Failings that Mar Domestic Happiness (1866)
  • Light After Darkness: Religious Poems (1867)
  • Queer Little People (1867)
  • Men of our Times; or, Leading Patriots of the Day (1868)
  • Oldtown Folks (1869)
  • Lady Byron Vindicated; a History of the Byron Contraversy, from its beginnings in 1816 to the present time (1870)
  • Pink & White Tyranny: A Society Novel (1871)
  • My Wife and I: or, Harry Henderson's History (1871)
  • Sam Lawson's Oldtown Fireside Stories (1872)
  • Women in Sacred History (1873)
  • Palmetto-leaves (1873)
  • We and our Neighbors; or, The Records of an Unfashionable Street (1875)
  • The First Christmas of New England (1876/2002)
  • Footsteps of the Master (1877)
  • The Daisy's First Winter and Other Stories (1877)
  • Poganuc People: Their Loves and Lives (1878)
  • A Dog's Mission; or, The Story of the Old Avery House, and other Stories (1880)
  • Nelly's Heroics with Other Heroic Stories (1883)
  • We Young Folks: Original Stories for Boys and Girls (1886)
  • Household Papers and Stories (1896)
  • Religious Studies: Sketches and Poems (1896)

Selected Resources

Sudlow, Lynda (1948 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Lyn Sudlow, born December 5, 1948, resides in North Yarmouth and is a highly respected Civil War historian and the director of the Falmouth Memorial Library. Prior to being employed by the town of Falmouth, she was the children's librarian at the McArthur Public Library in Biddeford, Maine. Sudlow wrote the Falmouth library's history, .

Selected Bibliogrpahy

  • Notable Maine Children's Authors and Illustrators (1989 a 21-page booklet on the state's most significant children's authors.
  • Made of Dreams: The Falmouth Memorial Library's First 50 Years (2002), to accompany the library's 50th anniversary celebration
  • The Fifth Maine Regiment Community Building: a History.
  • A Vast Army of Women: Maine's Uncounted Forces in the American Civil War (2000) has received high praise for the thoroughness of her research.

Swain, Ruth (1951 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's author Ruth Freeman Swain was born on May 25, 1951 in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania and lives now in East Blue Hill, Maine. She graduated from Vassar College in 1973. In addition to writing, she's also worked at book stores, sold antique jewelry, and was a nursery school teacher.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bedtime! (1999, illus. Cat Bowman Smith), a picture book that's a 'quirky, informative look at beds through the ages'
  • Hairdo, What We Do and Did to Our Hair (2002, illus. Cat Bowman Smith)
  • How Sweet It Is (and Was): A History of Candy (2003, illus. John O'Brien)
  • Underwear: What We Wear Under There, a history of underwear (2007, illus. John O'Brien).

Sweet, Melissa (1956 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Illustrator and winner of the Caldecott Honor and Sibert Medal, Melissa Sweet was born and raised in Wyckoff, New Jersey and now lives in Rockport, Maine. She attended Endicott College and Kansas City Art Institute.

Sweet has illustrated numerous books for children, as well as several cookbooks and also journals, notecards, and novelty items.

Selected Bibliography as Illustrator

Children

  • Into the Night (1990) by Deborah Heiligman
  • The Talking Pot: A Danish Folktale (1990) by Virginia Haviland
  • Pinky & Rex (1990), by James Howe
  • Rosie Runs Away (1990), by Maryann MacDonald
  • Rosie's Baby Tooth (1991), by Maryann MacDonald
  • Saturday Night Jamboree (1991), by Lee Wardlaw
  • Pinky & Rex and the Spelling Bee (1992), by James Howe
  • Pinky & Rex and the Mean Old Witch (1992), by James Howe
  • Hippity-Hop: A Pudgy Book (1992; Pudgy Board Book)
  • Sing Me a Window (1993), by Elizabeth Lee
  • Snippets: A Gathering of Poems, Pictures, and Possibilities (1993), by Charlotte Zolotow
  • Sycamore Street (1993), by C.B. Christiansen
  • Rosie and the Poor Rabbits (1994) by Maryann MacDonald
  • A House by the Sea (1994), by Joanne Ryder
  • Little Chick (1994; Wee Pudgy Board Books)
  • Marvelous Marvin and the Wolfman Mystery (1994) by Bonnie Pryor
  • Llama in Pajamas (1995), by Gisela Voss
  • Blast Off!: Poems About Space (1995), by Lee Bennett Hopkins
  • Marvelous Marvin and the Pioneer Ghost (1995), by Bonnie Pryor
  • Naptime, Laptime (1995), by Eileen Spinelli
  • Pinky & Rex and the Bully (1996), by James Howe
  • Pinky & Rex and the Double-Dad Weekend (1996), by James Howe
  • The Plant That Kept on Growing (1996) by Barbara Brenner
  • Pinky & Rex and the New Neighbors (1997), by James Howe
  • A Dozen Easter Eggs (Jewel Sticker Stories; 1997)
  • Monsters in Cyberspace (1997), by Dian Curtis Regan
  • Monsters and My One True Love (1998), Dian Curtis Regan
  • Bat Jamboree (1998), by Kathi Appelt
  • Pinky & Rex and the Perfect Pumpkin (1998), by James Howe
  • Pinky & Rex and the School Play (1998), by James Howe
  • Will You Take Care of Me? (1998) by Margaret Park Bridges
  • On Christmas Day in the Morning: A Traditional Carol (1999) by John Langstaff
  • Pinky & Rex Get Married (1999), by James Howe
  • Pinky & Rex and the New Baby (1999), by James Howe
  • Bats on Parade (1999), by Kathi Appelt
  • Leaving Vietnam: The Journey of Tuan Ngo, a Boat Boy (1999; Ready-To-Read, Level 3), by Sarah S. Kilborne
  • Girls Think of Everything: Stories of Ingenious Inventions by Women (2000) by Catherine Thimmesh
  • Bats Around the Clock (2000), by Kathi Appelt
  • Bouncing Time (2000), by Patricia Hubbell
  • Charlotte in Giverny (2000) by Joan Macphail Knight
  • A Snowman on Sycamore Street (2000), by C.B. Christiansen
  • The Three Little Pigs (2000)
  • Dirty Laundry Pile: Poems in Different Voices (2001), by Paul B. Janeczko
  • Good for You! Toddler Rhymes for Toddler Times (2001) by Stephanie Calmenson
  • Now What Can I Do (2001), by Margaret Park Bridges
  • Pinky & Rex Go to Camp (2001), by James Howe
  • It's Spring! (2001), by Samantha Berger and Pamela Chanko
  • Welcome, Baby!: Baby Rhymes for Baby Times (2002), by Stephanie Calmenson
  • Love and Kisses (2002/2005), a board book by Sarah Wilson
  • Pinky & Rex and the Just-Right Pet (2002), by James Howe
  • Ten Little Lambs (2002), by Alice B. McGinty
  • The 5,000-Year-Old Puzzle: Solving a Mystery of Ancient Egypt (2002) by Claudia Logan
  • Fiddle-I-Fee: A Farmyard Song for the Very Young (2002), a board book.
  • The Sky's the Limit: Stories of Discovery by Women and Girls (2002/2004), written by Catherine Thimmesh
  • Jingle Bells (2002)
  • My Grandma Is Coming to Town (2003) by Anna Grossnikle-Hines
  • Peek-A-Book: A Lift-The-Flap Bedtime Rhyme (2003) by Lee Wardlaw
  • Charlotte in Paris (2003) by Joan MacPhail Knight
  • Moonlight: The Halloween Cat (2003) by Cynthia Rylant
  • Giggle-Wiggle Wake-Up (2003) by Nancy White Carlstrom
  • I Love You, Too (2004) by Eve Bunting
  • Spring Is Here: A Barnyard Counting Book (2004), by Pamela Jane
  • Won't You Be My Kissaroo? (2004), by Joanne Ryder
  • The Boy Who Drew Birds: A Story of John James Audubon (2004), by Jacqueline Davies
  • Kindergarten Kids: Riddles, Rebuses, Wiggles, Giggles, and More! (2005), by Stephanie Calmenson
  • Schoolyard Rhymes (2005), by Judy Sierra
  • Baby Bear's Chairs (2005), by Jane Yolen
  • Charlotte in New York (2006) by Joan MacPhail Knight
  • Mother, May I? (2006) by Grace MacCarone
  • Baby Bear's Books (2006), by Jane Yolen
  • My A to Z Recipe Box: An Alphabet of Recipes for Kids (2007; cards), by Hilary Karmilowicz
  • Baby Bear's Big Dreams (2007), by Jane Yolen
  • Won't You Be My Hugaroo? (2007), by Joanne Ryder
  • Chicken Joy on Redbean Road: A Bayou Country Romp (2007), by Jacqueline Briggs Martin
  • Off to Kindergarten (2007), by Tony Johnston
  • Thank You! (2008), by Marion Dane Bauer
  • A River of Words: The Story of William Carlos Williams (2008) by Jen Bryant, for which Sweet won a Caldecott Honor award.
  • Balloons over Broadway: the true story of the puppeteer of Macy's Parade (2011) Author and Illustrator. Winner of the Sibert Informational Book Medal.
  • Alphamaniacs: Builders of 26 Wonders of the Word (2020) written by Paul Fleischman

Cookbooks

  • Vegetarian Planet: 350 Big-Flavor Recipes for Out-Of-This-World Food Every Day (1991) by Didi Emmons
  • Cheese: Quick and Easy Recipes for Elegant Entertaining (1996), by Lou Seibert Pappas and Marvin Scott Jarrett
  • Everybody Eats Well in Belgium Cookbook (1996) by Ruth Van Waerebeek-Gonzalez, et al.
  • The Good Stuff Cookbook (1997) by Helen Witty
  • In the French Kitchen Garden: The Joys of Cultivating a Potager (1998) by Georgeanne Brennan
  • Infusions: Making Flavored Oils, Vinegars and Spirits: Includes Book, Notecards With Envelopes, and Labels (1999), by Robin Davis

Selected Resources

Her website provides examples of her illustrations, contact information, and a brief biographical sketch.

Gould, John Thomas (1908 - 2003)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

John Thomas Gould was born Oct. 22, 1908, in Boston, but grew up in Freeport, Maine, and graduated from Bowdoin College. He spent most of his adult life on a farm in Lisbon Falls. Gould worked as a reporter, a free-lance journalist, and an editor. In 1942 he published his first essay in the Christian Science Monitor and contributed a weekly column for over 60 years. L.L.Bean, a boyhood friend, established a library in his Freeport Store and named it the John Gould Room. Governor Angus King proclaimed August 17, 2002, as John Gould Day throughout the state: "Whereas, John Gould has captured the unique Maine haracter and language on paper as few others have been able to do..." John and Dorothy Gould were married for 70 years and had two children. Gould died on Sept.1, 2003.

Selected bibliography

  • New England Town Meeting - Safeguard of Democracy (1940)
  • Pre-Natal Care for Fathers (1941)
  • Farmer Takes a Wife (1942) Bestseller
  • The House That Jacob Built (1947), Gould rebuilds the house his grandfather built
  • And One to Grow on: Recollections of a Maine Boyhood (1949)
  • Neither Hay Nor Grass (1951)
  • The Fastest Hound Dog In The State Of Maine (1953), tall tales about Maine
  • You Should Start Sooner, In Which Widely Separated Topics are Strangely Discussed by an Old Cuss (1965)
  • Last One in: Tales of a New England Boyhood (1966)
  • Europe on Saturday Night: The Farmer and his Wife Take a Trip (1968)
  • The Jonesport Raffle and Numerous Other Maine Veracities (1969)
  • Maine Lingo: Boiled Owls, Billdads & Wazzats (1975): Glossary that furnishes the reader with the terminologies of lobstermen, seafarers, farmers and lumbermen of the state's legendary North Woods.
  • Glass Eyes By the Bottle: Some Conversations About Some Conversation Pieces (1975)
  • This Trifling Distinction: Reminiscences from Down East (1978)
  • No Other Place (1984) The setting for this novel is the area of Penobscot Bay around 1611,
  • Stitch in Time (1985), observations on coastal Maine village inhabitants
  • Wines of Pentagoet (1986) Sequel to No Other Place.
  • Old Hundredth (1987): Humorous tales of Maine.
  • There Goes Maine!: A Somewhat History, Sort of, of the Pine Tree State (1990),
  • Funny About That (1992)
  • It Is Not Now: Tales from Maine's Back River (1993)
  • Dispatches from Maine: 1942-1992 (1994): A collection of essays originally published in the Christian Science Monitor; capture the distinct flavor of rural America and the people and concerns of Maine specifically.
  • Maine's Golden Road: A Memoir (1995): Narrative of retreats Gould and his daughter's father-in-law made over the years
  • Our Croze Nest (1997), A novel of Morning River Farm, far downeast
  • Tales from Rhapsody Home (Or, What They Don't Tell You About Senior Living) (2000)

Selected Resources

Quinlan, Patrick (1970 - )

Genre: Mystery, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Patrick Quinlan was born and grew up in the Bronx and Yonkers, New York. Now living in Falmouth, Maine, he is the author of crime thrillers and short stories.

He and actor Rutger Hauer co-authored the actor's autobiography, All Those Moments: Stories of Heroes, Villains, Replicants, and Blade Runners (2007).

Selected Bibliography

  • The Way Life Should Be: Stories by Contemporary Maine Authors Meil, Kathleen and Ari Meil, eds. (2005)
  • Smoked (2006)
  • The Takedown (2007)

Henry, Nancy (1961 - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet Nancy A. Henry was born in Florida on November 15, 1961, and moved to Maine in 1983. She graduated from the University of Maine School of Law and founded Moon Pie Press with Alice Persons. Henry's poems have been published in anthologies, as well as numerous print and online journals. Two of her poems, "Keys" and "People Who Take Care," have been featured on "The Writer's Almanac with Garrison Keillor."

Selected Bibliography

  • Our Lady of Let's All Sing (2007)
  • Who You Are (2008).

Owens, Mary (1947 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Mary Beth Owens lives in Walpole, Maine and is a children's book author and illustrator, a graphic artist, and an art teacher.

Selected Bibliography

Author/Illustrator

  • A Caribou Alphabet (1988)
  • Counting Cranes (1993)
  • Author, Be Blest: A Celebration of Seasons (1999)
  • Panda Whispers (2005)
  • Hawksbill Promise (2019)

Illustrator

  • The Man Who Sang in the Dark (1987, by Eth Clifford)
  • Leah's Song (1989, by Eth Clifford)
  • Rosebud and Red Flannel (1991, by Ethel Pochocki)
  • The Summer of the Dancing Horse (1991, by Eth Clifford)
  • Animals Don't Wear Pajamas: A Book about Sleeping (1992, by Eve B. Feldman)
  • Prize in the Snow (1994, by Bill Easterling)
  • Augustine Came to Kent (1996, by Barbara Willard)
  • Soup Pot: Stories for All Seasons for Children of All Ages (1996, by Ethel Pochocki)
  • Clapper Rail: The Secret Bird of the Marsh (1996, by Mary O'Neill Ketchum)
  • A Penny for a Hundred (1996, by Ethel Pochocki)
  • The Story of the Sea Glass (1999, by Anne Wescott Dodd)
  • The Gazebo (2002, by Ethel Pochocki)
  • First Rite: A Christmas Tradition (2004, by John Cole)
  • The Dump Man's Treasures (2008, by Lynn Plourde)

Jones, Carrie (1971 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry, Young Adult

Carrie Jones was born 1 March 1971 in Manchester, NH, grew up in Bedford, NH, and lives in Ellsworth, Maine with her husband and daughter.

Jones has a BA from Bates College and an MFA in writing from Vermont College. She was formerly editor of the Ellsworth Weekly and has been a reporter for other Maine newspapers. In 2006, she was awarded the Martin Dibner Fellowship for Maine Writers.

Jones has published several contemporary young adult novels. Her poems and nonfiction have appeared in Peninsula Review, Northwoods Journal and Flying Horse Review.

Selected Bibliography

  • Tips on Having a Gay (ex) Boyfriend (2007)
  • Love (and Other Uses for Duct Tape) (2008)
  • Girl, Hero (August 2008)
  • Need (2009)
  • Captivate (2010)
  • Endure (2012)

Selected Links

Thomson, Sarah (1970 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Poetry, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Young Adult

Sarah Thomson was born on 15 April 1970, grew up in St. Louis, Missouri, and in Madison, Wisconsin. She graduated from Oberlin College in Ohio in 1993, worked in publishing in New York City for 10 years, and then settled in Portland, Maine. M

Her books include picture books (fiction and non-fiction) for children, poetry, I Can Read books, board books, as well as books for older children and teens.

Selected Bibliography

Books for Younger Children

  • Imagine a Night (2003
  • Stars and Stripes: The Story of the American Flag (2003)
  • Imagine a Day (2005),
  • Amazing Tigers (2004)
  • Amazing Sharks (2005)
  • Amazing Gorillas (2005)
  • Amazing Whales (2005)
  • Amazing Snakes (2006)
  • Amazing Dolphins (2006)
  • Extreme Stars Q&A (2006)
  • Feel the Summer (2006)
  • Extreme Aircraft!Q&A (2007)
  • My Flag Book (2007)
  • Extreme Dinosaurs Q&A (2007)
  • American Flag Q&A (2008)
  • Imagine A Place (Sept. 2008)
  • Pirates, Ho! (Sept. 2008)
  • Cinderella (2012) illus. by Nicoletta Ceccoli
  • Around the Neighborhood: A Counting Lullaby (2012) illus. by Jana Christy

Books for Older Children and Teens

  • The Dragon's Son (2001)
  • The Library of Author Biographies: Gary Paulsen (2002)
  • The Library of Author Biographies: Robert Cormier (2003)
  • The Manny (2005)
  • The Secret of the Rose (2006)
  • Astronauts and Other Space Heroes FYI (2007)
  • Dragon's Egg (2007)

Carey, Lisa (1970 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Lisa Carey was born in 1970 in Boston and raised in Brookline, MA. She received a B.A. in English and Philosophy from Boston College in 1992 and an MFA in Writing from Vermont College in 1996. She lived in Ireland for a while, writing her first novel there. She lives in Portland, Maine with her husband, LibraryThing founder Tim Spaulding, and their son.

Selected Bibliography

  • Every Visible Thing (2006)
  • Love in the Asylum (2004)
  • In the Country of the Young (2000)
  • The Mermaids Singing (1998)

Jabar, Cynthia (1958 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Children's book illustrator Cynthia Jabar divides her time between Peaks Island ME and New York City. She previously lived in Iowa City, IA.

Selected Bibliography

Illustrated for Children

  • How Many, How Many, How Many by Rick Walton (1993)
  • A Koala for Katie: An Adoption Story by Jonathan London (1993)
  • Good Morning, Pond by Alyssa Satin Capucilli (1994)
  • No Hickory No Dickory No Dock: Caribbean Nursery Rhymes by John Agard and Grace Nichols (1995)
  • Rain Song by Lezlie Evans (1995)
  • The Frog Who Wanted to Be a Singer by Linda Goss (1996)
  • Snow Dance by Lezlie Evans (1997)
  • Won't You Come and Play with Me? by Mary Lee Donovan (1998)
  • The Greatest Gymnast of All: Opposites (MathStart 1) by Stuart J. Murphy (1998)
  • Daddies Are for Catching Fireflies (Lift-the-Flap) by Harriet Ziefert (1999)
  • Mommies are for Counting Stars (Lift-the-Flap) by Harriet Ziefert (1999)
  • The Sound of Day, the Sound of Night by Mary O'Neill (1999)
  • Game Time! (MathStart 3) (2000)
  • Kittens by Don L. Curry (2000)
  • Sylvia's Garage by Debra Lee (2001)
  • The Big Meow by Elizabeth Spires (2002)
  • A Nap for Zap (2002; by Kama Einhorn)
  • The Sundae Scoop (MathStart 2)by Stuart J. Murphy (2003)
  • The Scrubbly-Bubbly Car Wash by Irene O'Garden (2003)
  • Tally O'Malley (MathStart 2) by Stuart J. Murphy (2004)
  • Grace for an Island Meal by Rachel Field (2006)
  • One Frog Sang by Shirley Parenteau (2007)
  • I Love the New Baby at Our House...Most of the Time by Leslie Kimmelman (June 2009)

Illustrated for Older Children

  • The Girls' Guide to Life: How to Take Charge of the Issues that Affect You by Catherine Dee (1997)

Written and Illustrated

  • Party Day! A Birthday Counting Book (1987)
  • Alice Ann Gets Ready for School (1989
  • Bored Blue? Think What You Can Do! (1991)
  • Shimmyshake Earthquake: Don't Forget to Dance Poems (1992)
  • Wow! It Sure is Good to Be You! (2006)

Corson, Trevor (1969 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Trevor Corson, who was born in July 1969 in Boston, MA, and grew up in Washington, D.C., lived for a couple of years in Southwest Harbor, Maine, working as a lobsterman. He now he lives in New York City. His great-grandfather, a librarian in Boston, used to bring his grandmother to Little Cranberry Island when she was small, and when she got married, she and her husband continued visiting Little Cranberry, eventually buying an old house on the island in 1940.

Corson has worked as a newspaper writer, and a magazine writer and editor, covering such diverse topics as "food ethics, hybrid cars, film, military affairs, organ transplants, Japanese Buddhism, and Chinese politics" for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic Monthly, and The Nation, among others. Before publishing his bestselling Secret Life of Lobsters, he spent two years studying philosophy in China, three years studying Buddhism in Japan, and two years as a commercial fisherman off the Maine coast. He's a fluent speaker of Chinese and Japanese, a summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Princeton University with a double major in Religion and East Asian Studies, and an amateur comedian.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Secret Life Of Lobsters: How Fishermen And Scientists Are Unraveling The Mysteries Of Our Favorite Crustacean (2004), which began as an Atlantic Monthly essay and which was named a best nature book of the year by USA Today and Discover
  • Story of Sushi: An Unlikely Saga of Raw Fish and Rice (2007), previously titled The Zen of Fish: The Story of Sushi, from Samurai to supermarket, which was a New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice selection and a Zagat Best Food Book of the Year.

Selected Resources

Abbott, Jacob (1803 - 1879)

Genre: Children's Literature

Novelist, historian and Congregational clergyman from Hallowell (who also lived in Farmington), Jacob Abbott, an 1820 graduate of Bowdoin College, was the author of over 200 books. His best-known were the "Little Rollo" books and his "Lucy" books, which mixed instruction with entertainment. Abbott's granddaughter, Eleanor Hallowell Abbott (1872-1958), was a popular short-story writer, novelist, and memoirist in her own right, her best known work is Molly Make-Believe (1910).

Selected Bibliography

  • American History (1860)
  • Rollo at play (1865)
  • The corner stone (1872)
  • Franconia stories (1850-53)

Selected Resources

Acheson, James (1938 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

James Acheson, born in Dover, New Hampshire, is a professor in the Department of Anthropology and School of Marine Sciences, University of Maine, Orono.

He attended Tufts University for two years and completed his undergraduate studies in biology and sociology at Colby College in 1962. In 1970 he earned a Ph.D. in Social Anthropology at the University of Rochester.

He has taught at the University of Maine since 1968. His research interests include economic and maritime anthropology, and Meso-America economic development. He has been the recipient of numerous research grants from the National Marine Fisheries Service, National Science Foundation University of Maine Sea Grant, and NOAA/Sea.

Acheson is best known for his economic and sociological studies of Maine fishing communities.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Lobster Gangs of Maine (1988), the first thorough study of the contrast and conflicts between the industry's customs and state regulation, is included in The Mirror of Maine.
  • The Fishing Ports of Maine and New Hampshire (with Ann Acheson, John Bort, and Jayne Lello; 1980)
  • Question of the Commons: The Culture and Ecology of Communal Resource (with Bonnie McCay; 1987)
  • Anthropology and Institutional Economics (1994)
  • Capturing the Commons: Devising Institutions to Manage the Maine Lobster Industry (2003).

Selected Resources

Ackerman, Ned (1943 - )

Genre: Young Adult

Ned Ackerman, a resident of Camden, is the author of one young adult novel. He is also the subject of a documentary movie Coaster: Adventure of the John F. Leavitt.

Selected Bibliography

  • Spirit horse, 1998

Selected Resources

Bourque, Bruce (1943 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Bruce J. Bourque, a resident of Hallowell, is Chief Archaeologist and Curator of Ethnography at the Maine State Museum. He is also a visiting professor at Bates College. He has written numerous books and articles on Maine's Native American populations.

Selected Bibliography

  • Uncommon Threads: Wabanaki Textiles, Clothing, and Costume, with Laureen A. LaBar, 2009
  • Twelve Thousand Years: American Indians in Maine, with Steven L. Cox and Ruth H. Whitehead, 2001
  • Diversity and Complexity in Prehistoric Maritime Societies: a Gulf of Maine Perspective, 1995
  • Prehistory of the Central Maine Coast, 1992
  • The Swordfish Hunters: The History and Ecology of an Ancient American Sea People (2012)

Selected Resources

Mayo, Eleanor (1920 - 1981)

Genre: General Fiction

Eleanor Mayo was a longtime resident of the Mount Desert Island area, author of five novels and held several town offices over the years.

Selected Bibliography

  • Forever Strangers, 1958
  • Swan's Harbor, 1953
  • October Fire, 1951
  • Loom of the Land, 1946
  • Turn Home, 1945

Selected Resources

Currie, Ron (1975 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Ron Currie, Jr. was born and remains in Waterville, and has written satirical and psychological fiction dealing with the world at large. His word has appeared in "Glimmer Train", "The Sun", "Other Voices" and "Night Train." In 2008 he was given the New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award.

Selected Bibliography

  • Everything Matters! (2009)
  • God is Dead (2007)
  • Flimsy Little Plastic Miracles: A True Story (2013)

Selected Resources

Mostly Fiction Book Reviews

Merriam, Kendall (1942 - )

Genre: Poetry

Kendall Merriam is known in Maine literary circles for his poetry, plays and sense of humor. One of his early titles was a collaboration with Mark Melnicove, "The Uncensored Guide to Maine", written in 1984. A longtime resident of Richmond, Mr. Merriam was born in Rockland and has returned to that city.

Selected Bibliography

  • Human Earth Ocean Soul: Poems Around, About, and for Midcoast Maine, 2008
  • The Wind Horse: Poems and a Play in Honor of Jeanette and Biju Pradhan, 2007
  • The Owls Head General Store Poems: In Honor of Anne Maher and Her Staff, 2007
  • Spring River: Poems From a Chinese Restaurant, 2002
  • A Woman's Heart: Three Short Monologues (2012)

Sockabasin, Allen (1944 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Allen Sockabasin was born in Peter Dana Point (Mud-doc-mig-goog) near Princeton, Maine, the tenth of eleven children. He left school early to support his siblings, and became a songwriter as a very young man. In his quest to preserve the Passamaquoddy language and folklore, he has recorded his music and authored books.

Selected Bibliography

  • An Upriver Passamaquoddy, 2007 winner Jean Byers Sampson Center for Diversity in Maine?s 2010 Catalyst for Change Award.
  • Thanks To the Animals, 2005

Selected Links

Hubbell, William (1934 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

William Hubbell is a professional photographer living in Cumberland Foreside. He has compiled a number of books depicting Maine and New England.

Bill is the winner of the 2007 Independent Publisher's Book Award for Best Regional (Northeast) Nonfiction for Good Fences.

Selected Bibliography

  • New England Coast, c1992
  • Seasons of Maine, 2001
  • Safe Harbor: Exploring Maine's Protected Bays, Coves and Anchorages, c2003
  • Good Fences: a Pictorial History of New England's Stone Walls, c2006
  • Portland: the City by the Sea, c2009

Weston, Gaylord (1944 - )

Genre: Poetry

Gaylord Day Weston is a poet living in Belgrade.

Selected Bibliography

  • He Gives Me Flowers, c2007
  • Belgrade-Just Another Maine Town, c1998

Coxe, Louis (1918 - 1993)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Louis Osborne Coxe led a distinguished career as a poet, playwright, critic and professor. Born in Manchester, NH in 1918, he graduated from Princeton University in 1940. He taught at his alma mater in 1947, and returned for a year in 1962. He also joined the faculties of Harvard and the University of Minnesota before coming to Bowdoin College in 1955, where he remained until retirement.

He received numerous honors, including: Donaldson Award for Drama-1952 Brandeis University Creative Arts Award-1960 National Endowment for the Arts Grant-1977 Academy of American Poets Prize-1978

Selected Bibliography

  • The North Well: New Poems, 1985
  • Passage: Selected Poems, 1943-1978, 1979
  • Enabling Acts: Selected Essays in Criticism, c1976
  • Edwin Arlington Robinson: the Life of Poetry, 1969
  • The Last Hero: and Other Poems, 1965
  • Billy Budd, by Louis O. Coxe and Robert Chapman, 1962, c1951

Selected Resources

Boylan, Jennifer (1958 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories, Young Adult

Jennifer Boylan, a professor of English at Colby College, is best known for her autobiographical writing. She is also a novelist, young adult and short story author. She is a nationally known advocate for civil rights.

Selected Bibliography

  • Remind Me to Murder You Later (1988) short stories
  • The Planets (1991)
  • The Constellations (1994) A sequel to The Planets
  • She's Not There: A Life in Two Genders (2003)
  • I'm Looking Through You: Growing up Haunted (2008)
  • Falcon Quinn and the Black Mirror (2010)
  • Stuck in the Middle with You: A Memoir of Parenting in Three Genders (2013)

Cruikshank, Margaret (1940 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Margaret (Peg) Cruikshank was a professor of women's studies and LGBT studies at the University of Maine (retired, June 2010) and is a faculty associate of the Center on Aging there. She is known for her ground breaking work establishing the importance of lesbian studies. She previously taught at the City College of San Fransisco. Cruikshank lives in Corea, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Lesbian studies: present and future (1982) Editor
  • The Lesbian path (1985) Editor
  • The gay and lesbian liberation movement (1992)
  • Learning to be old : gender, culture, and aging (2003)
  • Fierce With Reality: An Anthology of Literature on Aging (2007)
  • Learning to be old : gender, culture, and aging 2nd ed. (2009)

Selected Resources

Legler, Gretchen ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Gretchen Legler is a professor of creative writing at the University of Maine, Farmington.

She lives on an 80 acre farm where she enjoys raising goats and chickens, chopping wood, tapping maple trees and working in her organic garden.

She received her BA at Macalester College and her MA and PhD at the University of Minnesota.

The recipient of two Pushcart Prizes (1992 and 1998), Gretchen Legler has published essays, stories, and reviews in Georgia Review, Indiana Review, Orion, Women's Review of Books, and other magazines.

Her honors and awards include Association for the Study of Literature and Environment award in environmental creative writing for On the Ice, 2007; finalist for Publishing Triangle Judy Grahn Award for Lesbian Nonfiction for On the Ice, 2006; second place Graywolf Press New Nonfiction Award for On the Ice, 1005; visiting scholar, Cambridge University Scott Polar Research Institute, Cambridge England, 2001; National Science Foundation Office of Polar Programs Antarctic Artists and Writers Program Fellowship, 1997-1998;

Selected Bibliography

  • All the Powerful Invisible Things: a Sportswoman?s Notebook (c1995)
  • On the Ice: an Intimate Portrait of Life at McMurdo Station, Antarctica (2005)

Lemke, William ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Historian William Lemke is a professor at St. Joseph's College in Standish ME and lives in Westbrook. He received his PhD in History from the University of Maine (Orono) in 1973.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Wild, Wild East: Unusual Tales of Maine History (1990)
  • A Pride of Lions: Joshua Chamberlain & Other Maine Civil War Heroes (1997)

Leonard, Elizabeth ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Elizabeth D. Leonard was born in New York but spent much of her youth abroad in the Netherlands and Japan.

She received her B.A. from the College of New Rochelle in New York and her M.A. and PhD (both in American History) from the University of California, Riverside in 1992.

She has spent her professional career at Colby College where she is now the John J. and Cornelia V. Gibson Professor of History and the recipient of a permanent Wiswell Research Fellowship.

Her area of expertise is nineteenth century U.S. history, especially women's history; women in the Civil War; women's history and women's culture in colonial Latin America.

Selected Bibliography

  • Yankee Women : Gender Battles In The Civil War (1994)
  • All the daring of the soldier : women of the Civil War armies (1999)
  • Lincoln's avengers : justice, revenge, and reunion after the Civil War (c2004)

Lewis, Jeffrey ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Jeffrey Lewis was born in New York and received his education at Yale. He lives in Los Angeles and Castine, Maine. He won two Emmy Awards and many other honors as a writer and producer of the television show Hill Street Blues.

His "Meritocracy Quartet" is intended to chart the progress of a generation. The first book of the quartet, Meritocracy: A Love Story, won both the Independent Publishers Book Award for General Fiction and the ForeWord Book of the Year Silver Award for Fiction.

Bibliography

  • Meritocracy : a love story, a novel (2004)
  • The conference of the birds : a novel (2005)
  • Theme song for an old show : a novel (2007)
  • Adam the king : a novel (2007)
  • Berlin Cantata: A Novel (2012)

Related Links

Lindquist, Kristen ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet and essayist Kristen Lindquist is a Maine native currently living in Camden, Maine. She attended Middlebury College and received an MFA from the University of Oregon. She has taught various writing and haiku workshops, as well as for the Johns Hopkins University's Center for Talented Youth, and has been a board member of the Live Poets Society. Her writing has been published in such venues as the Maine Times, Feminist Times, Cafe Review, Bangor Daily News, Split Rock Review, and Down East Magazine, as well as various haiku journals. She writes a regular nature column for Penobscot Bay Pilot, and maintains a daily haiku blog, Book of Days. Prizes she has been awarded include the 1992 Bread Loaf Poetry Prize, the 2001 Red Fox Award, and the Postmark Poetry Prize in 2014. Her book Transportation was a finalist for a Maine Literary Award in 2012.

Bibliography

  • Invocation to the birds, part of the boxed series Walking to Windward: Poets of New England (2001)
  • Bald and ragged mountains : the poetry of place (2006)
  • Transportation (2011)
  • Tourists in the Known World: New & Selected Poems (2017)

Lipp, Frederick ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Award-winning author Frederick Lipp lives in Whitefield, ME. He is the author of 7 multicultural children's picture books set in different countries around the world: Cambodia, Sri Lanka, and even the United States, in the communities of Maine's newest immigrants.

His first book, The Caged Birds of Phnom Penh, was named a Notable Book for a Global Society by the International Reading Association.

Lipp is a retired Unitarian Minister who worked in both the United States and United Kingdom. In addition to writing children's books, he is founder and president of the Cambodian Arts and Scholarship Foundation, which helps educate girls in Cambodia.

Bibliography

  • That cat is not for sale (1998)
  • The caged birds of Phnom Penh (2001)
  • Tea leaves (2003)
  • Bread song (2004)
  • Fatima (2007)
  • Running shoes (2008)
  • Lady of the Lobster: Grandpa's Best Kept Secret (2020)

Selected Links

Kids Go Global

Lord, Cynthia ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Young Adult

Cynthia Lord grew up in New Hampshire and lives in Topsham ME.

A former full-time teacher, she taught for a time on one of the islands off the coast of Maine. She now does school visits doing presentations related to her books.

Her books are written for young adults and children. Her first book, Rules was a 2007 Newbery Honor book.

Bibliography

  • Rules (2006)
  • Hot Rod Hamster (2010)
  • Touch Blue (2010) Set in one of Maine's island schools

Selected Resources

McCarthy, Mary (1912 - 1989)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Short Stories

Mary McCarthy was born in 1912 in Seattle, WA. She graduated from Vassar College in 1933; after graduation she taught briefly at Bard and Sarah Lawrence. She made her home in Paris and Castine, ME. Mary McCarthy died of lung cancer at New York Hospital on October 25, 1989. She is buried in Castine Cemetery in Castine, Maine

She worked in New York as an editor at The Nation and The New Republic, and as theater critic for the leftist political and intellectual journal Partisan Review.

McCarthy won several literary awards: the Horizon prize (1949), two Guggenheim fellowships (1949-50 and 1959-60), the MacDowell Medal for Literature and the National Medal for Literature (1984).

She was a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters, the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, and the American Academy in Rome. She received honorary degrees from several colleges and universities, including Bowdoin, Colby, and the University of Maine at Orono.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sights and Spectacles, 1937-1956 (1956) (Theater reviews)
  • On the Contrary (c1961) (essays)
  • Cast a Cold Eye (1963)
  • Memories of a Catholic Girlhood (c1985)
  • The Group (1991)

Selected Links

McDonald, John (1945? - )

Genre: General Fiction

John McDonald was born in Rhode Island (his father was a Mainer) but moved to and grew up in Tenants Harbor. He lives in South Paris.

He is a well-known Maine humorist and story-teller who has had a weekly newspaper column and radio show highlighting his Maine-style humor.

He is executive director of the Maine Storyteller's Festival.

Bibliography

  • The Maine Dictionary (2000)
  • A Moose and a Lobster Walk Into a Bar-- (2002)
  • Down the Road a Piece : a Storyteller's Guide to Maine (2005)
  • John McDonald's Maine trivia: A Useful Guide to Useless Information (2012)

Selected Links

McLane, Charles (1920? - 2008)

Genre:

Charles Bancroft McLane was a retired Dartmouth College professor and author who lived in Hanover.

He was born in Concord, NH and was educated at St. Paul's School in Concord and Dartmouth College. He received his doctorate in public law and government from Columbia University in 1955. After beginning his academic career at Bard College and Swarthmore College, he joined the Dartmouth College faculty in 1957 as a professor of Russian civilization, and later became chairman of the Government Department.

He taught overseas at the University of Geneva in Switzerland, Fourah Bay College in Sierra Leone, West Africa, and at the London School of Economics. He retired from teaching in the late 1980s.

As a young man, McLane skied competitively and was a former captain of the Dartmouth College ski team. During World War II, he volunteered for the U.S. Army's 10th Mountain Division Ski Troops, serving from 1941 to 1944. For the next two years, he served with the Army's Psychological Warfare Division as an intelligence officer in Europe, reaching the rank of captain.

For a time in the 1950's, McLane was a cultural attache at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow.

McLane authored several scholarly publications on Soviet relations. He and his wife co-authored a multi-volume history of the islands of the Maine coast. He also wrote one novel, Red Right Returning, a tale of Maine island life set in the 1930s and 1940s.

Bibliography

  • Soviet Policy and the Chinese Communists, 1931-1946 (1958)
  • Soviet Strategies in Southeast Asia; an Exploration of Eastern Policy under Lenin and Stalin (1966)
  • Soviet-Middle East Relations (1973)
  • Soviet-Asian Relations (1973)
  • Soviet-African Relations (1974)
  • Islands of the Mid-Maine Coast (1982-1994)
  • Red Right Returning : a Novel (2004)

Medwed, Mameve (1942 - 2021)

Genre: General Fiction

Novelist Mameve Medwed was born and lived in Bangor. She graduated from Bangor High School and received her B.A. in English from Simmons College. She has worked as a book reviewer for the Boston Globe, Washington Post and Newsday and has taught writing at local colleges and adult education classes.

She lives with her family in Cambridge, Massachusetts but considers Bangor to be her "home town."

Bibliography

  • Mail (1997)
  • Host Family (2000)
  • The End of an Error (2003)
  • How Elizabeth Barrett Browning Saved My Life (2006)
  • Of Men and Their Mothers (2008)
  • Minus Me (2021)

Melnicove, Mark ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Poet and teacher Mark Melnicove lives in Dresden and is a former publisher and editor.

Melnicove received his MFA in literature and writing from Bennington College and teaches creative writing, humanities, and film studies at Falmouth HS, Falmouth, Maine. He is also a member of the faculty of the USM Stonecoast MFA in Creative Writing program and has been executive director of the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance.

He was one of the founders of Tilbury House Publishers in Gardiner, ME.

Selected Bibliography

Selected Websites

Meserve, Tammy (1959 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Tammy Lee Richards Meserve was born and raised in Damariscotta and lives with her family in Edgecomb. She is a journalist, poet and children's book author.

As a child and young aspiring author, she was mentored by Mary C. Jane of Newcastle, a children's mystery author.

Selected Bibliogrpahy

  • There's a Moose Loose in the Hoose! (2009)
  • There's a Moose Loose at the Fair! (2012)

Brown, Lyn ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Lyn Mikel Brown is the Professor of Education and Human Development at Colby College.

She received her B.A. in Psychology from Ottawa University (Kansas) in 1979 and her Ed.D. in Human Development and Psychology from Harvard in 1989. She has been an American Association of University women Educational foundation Scholar-in-Residence and a winner of a National Academy of Education Spencer Postdoctoral Fellowship for her research on girls.

Her focus is on the social and psychological development of girls and women. She is a founding member of the Harvard Project on Women's Psychology and Girls' Development and co-creator of the nonprofit Hardy Girls Healthy Women.

Selected Bibliography

  • Meeting at the Crossroads: Women's Psychology and Girls' Development (with Carol gilligan) (1993) (New York Times Notable Book of the Year)
  • Raising their Voices: The politics of Girls Anger (1998)
  • Girlfighting: Betrayal and Rejection Among Girls (2004)
  • Packaging Girlhood: Rescuing Our Daughters from Marketers' Schemes (with Sharon Lamb) (2006)

Selected Resources

Miller, Wiley (1951 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Illustrator

Wiley Miller is the man behind the award-winning comic strip Non Sequitur set in fictional Whatchacallit, ME.

He was born and raised in California and studied art at Virginia Commonwealth University. He worked at a Hollywood educational film studio before becoming an editorial cartoonist in North Carolina and later for the San Francisco Examiner.

Miller was named Best Editorial Cartoonist by the California Newspaper Publishers Association in 1988; he won the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award for editorial cartooning in 1991. His comic strip Non Sequitur has won the National Cartoonists Society's Newspaper Panel Cartoon Award for 1995, 1996 and 1998 and their Newspaper Comic Strip Award for 1992.

Miller and his family moved from "too perfect" Santa Barbara to Kennebunkport for the creative influence it afforded.

Bibliography

  • Why We'll Never Understand Each Other (2003)
  • The Extraordinary Adventures of Ordinary Basil (2006)
  • Attack of the Volcano Monkeys (2008)

Selected Links

Mizner, David ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

David Mizner was born and grew up in Waterville.

He went to college at Tufts and the Columbia University School of Journalism. He has been involved in political activities since college, first in Los Angeles volunteering for the Barbara Boxer for Senate Campaign.

He worked for People for the American Way in Washington D.C. and the Vera Institute of Justice and Human Rights First.

He has written for the Los Angeles Times, Prison Life and Church and State. He began writing fiction in 1998 and has written two novels.

Bibliography

  • Political Animal: a Novel (2004)
  • Hartsburg USA: a Novel (2007)

Monks, Robert (1933 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Robert Augustus Gardner Monks was born in Massachusetts to a Boston Brahmin family. He received his degrees from Harvard College, Cambridge University and Harvard Law School. Monks lives in Cape Elizabeth.

He was a practicing attorney in a prestigious Boston law firm and held high office for several major companies. President Reagan appointed him director of the United States Synthetic Fuels corporation and one of the founding Trustees of the Federal Employees' Retirement System. He also served in the U. S. Department of Labor as the Administrator of the Office of Pension and Welfare Benefit Programs which oversees the U.S. pension system.

He is the founder of Institutional Shareholder Services, Inc. which is a leading corporate governance consulting firm which advises corporate and government pension funds.

He is a businessman turned political activist who started the shareholder activist movement whose mission is to improve corporate accountability.

Selected Bibliography

  • Power and Accountability (1991)
  • Watching the Watchers : Corporate Governance for the 21st Century (1996)
  • The Emperor's Nightingale : Restoring the Integrity of the Corporation in the Age of Shareholder Activism (1998)
  • The New Global Investors : How Shareowners can Unlock Sustainable Prosperity Worldwide (2001)
  • Reel and Rout (2004)
  • Corporate Governance (2004)
  • Corpocracy : How CEOs and the Business Roundtable Hijacked the World's Greatest Wealth Machine--and How to get it Back (2008)

Selected Resources

  • A Traitor to His Class: Robert A. G. Monks and the Battle to Change Corporate America by Hilary Rosenberg (1999)

Moore, Anne (1871 - 1961)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Anne Carroll Moore (born Annie -- she changed her name in her 50's) was born in Limerick, ME. She was educated at Limerick Academy, the Branford Academy for Women in Massachusetts and the Library School at Pratt Institute. She designed the children's library at the Pratt Institute Free Library at the time when the concept of the children's library was in its infancy.

She was recruited to head the newly-established Office of Work with Children at the New York Public Library and became the pioneer in children's librarianship, developing the first children's story hours and borrowing priveleges.

In 1918 she published the first edition of Children's Books suggested as Holiday Gifts, a pamphlet which she published every year after until 1941.

She wrote children's literature reviews for The Horn Book, The Bookman, and The New York Herald Tribune. The Tribune also carried her column "The Three Owls" from 1924-1930.

She retired from NYPL in 1941 and went on to teach at the Graduate School of Library Studies in Berkeley, CA.

She received the Doctor of Letters in 1940 from the University of Maine and in 1955 from the Pratt Institute.

She died in New York City in 1961.

Selected Bibliography

  • Roads to Childhood : Views and Reviews of Children's Books (1920)
  • New Roads to Childhood (1923)
  • Nicholas : a Manhattan Christmas Story (1924)
  • The Three Owls : a Book About Children's Books, their Authors, Artists and Critics (1925 - )
  • The Bold Dragoon and other Ghostly Tales by Washington Irving, selected and edited by Anne Carroll Moore (1930)
  • Knickerbocker's History of New York by Washington Irving ; edited by Anne Carroll Moore (1930)
  • Nicholas and the Golden Goose (1932)
  • Children's Books of Yesterday : an Exhibition from Many Countries (1933)
  • The Creation and Criticism of Children's Books : a Retrospect and a Forecast (1934)
  • The Choice of a Hobby : Unique Descriptive List of Books Offering Inspiration and Guidance to Hobby Riders and Hobby Hunters; a Springboard for Personal Adventure (1934)
  • Seven Stories High (1934)
  • Reading for Pleasure (1935)
  • My Roads to Childhood : Views and Reviews of Children's Books (1939)
  • A Century of Kate Greenaway [1946]

Selected Resources

Moore, Gustav ( - )

Genre: Illustrator

Gustav Moore grew up on a farm in Whitefield. He graduated in 1996 from the Rochester Institute of Technology with a degree in illustration.

Bibliography

  • Stone wall secrets by Kristine and Robert Thorson (1998)
  • Everybody's somebody's lunch by Cherie Mason (1998)
  • Earth cycles by Michael Elsohn Ross (2001)
  • Life cycles by Michael Elsohn Ross (2001)
  • Wind Bird : gift of the mist by Sarah Stiles Bright (2006)

Selected Links

Morse, Eleanor ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Eleanor Lincoln Morse lives on Peaks Island. She received a Master of Arts in Teaching from Yale University and a Master of Fine Arts in Writing from Vermont College.

She has taught at the University of Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland, through the University of Maine System, Portland Adult and Community Education, Maine Medical Center and established writing programs in three Maine prisons with grants from the Maine Humanities Council.

Her novel Chopin's Garden won the 2008 Independent Book Publisher's Award (IPPY) for best regional fiction (Northeast region) and the 2008 Maine Literary Award from the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance for best published fiction.

Bibliography

  • Green (2003)
  • Chopin's Garden (2006)
  • An Unexpected Forest: a Novel (2007)
  • White Dog Fell from the Sky: [a novel] (2013)

Mulford, Clarence (1883 - 1956)

Genre: General Fiction

Clarence Mulford was born in Streator Illinois in 1883. He worked as a reporter and writer for a monthly magazine called Municipal Journal and Engineer and then worked in civil service until his retirement to Fryeburg ME in 1926.

He wrote his first story in 1904 which won $100 for second place in a contest in Metropolitan magazine. He published a series of short stories in Outing Magazine which he later combined to create his first novel -- The Bar 20.

He was the creator of the western character Hopalong Cassidy and wrote many short stories and novels about the exploits of Cassidy and his companions on the Bar 20 ranch. Hopalong Cassidy became a wildly popular character and several movies, comic books, etc. were created around the character.

Mulford lived and worked in Fryeburg until his death in 1956.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bar-20 Being a Record of Certain Happenings that Occurred in the Otherwise Peaceful Lives of one Hopalong Cassidy and His Companions on the Range (1907)
  • The Orphan (1908)
  • Bar-20 Days (1911)
  • Hopalong Cassidy (c1910)
  • The Man from Bar 20: a Story of the Cow Country (1918)
  • Bring Me His Ears (1922)
  • Black Buttes (1923)
  • Hopalong Cassidy Returns (1924)
  • Rustlers Valley (1924)
  • Mesquite Jenkins (1928)
  • Hopalong Cassidy and the Eagle's Brood (1931)
  • The Round Up (1933)
  • Trail Dust: Hopalong Cassidy and the Bar 20 with the Trail Herd (1934)
  • On the Trail of the Tumbling T (c1935)
  • Hopalong Cassidy Takes Cards (c1937)

  • Hopalong Cassidy Serves a Writ (c1941)

    Selected Resources

  • Bar-20: The Life of Clarence E. Mulford, Creator of Hopalong Cassidy, With Seven Original Stories Reprinted by Francis M. Nevins (1993)
  • Maine Authors: a Collection of Clippings from the Portland Sunday Telegram

Selected Resources

Murphy, Julien ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Julien S. Murphy Ph.D., is founding Director of the Bioethics Project and tenured Professor of Philosophy at the University of Southern Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The constructed body : AIDS, reproductive technology, and ethics (c1995)
  • Feminist interpretations of Jean-Paul Sartre edited by Julien S. Murphy (c1999)
  • Gender struggles : practical approaches to contemporary feminism edited by Constance L. Mui and Julien S.Murphy (c2002)

Nash, Scott (1959 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Children's book illustrator, designer, consultant, entrepreneur Scott Nash received a master's degree from the Cranbrook Academy of Art and a B.F.A in Graphic Design from the Swain School of Design.

He has been a professor at the Maine College of Art and a consultant for the Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus. He has worked as a designer of children's media for many years and owns Nashbox, a design studio specific to children.

Selected Bibliography

  • Help! : an absolutely indispensable guide to life for girls! by Nancy Holyoke (c1995)
  • Saturday night at the dinosaur stomp by Carol Diggory Shields (1997)
  • Oh, Tucker! by Steven Kroll (1998)
  • Over the moon by Rachel Vail (c1998)
  • Martian rock by Carol Diggory Shields (1999)
  • Monster musical chairs by Stuart J. Murphy (c2000)
  • Six hogs on a scooter by Eileen Spinelli (2000)
  • Monkey business by David Martin (2000)
  • Grandpa's overalls by Tony Crunk (c2001)
  • The bugliest bug by Carol Diggory Shields (2002)
  • Snow day! by Patricia Lakin (c2002)
  • Flat Stanley by Jeff Brown (2003)
  • Tuff Fluff : the case of Duckie's missing brain (author and illustrator) (2004)
  • Camping day by Patricia Lakin (c2009)
  • The High Skies Adventures of Blue Jay the Pirate (2012)
  • I'm Afraid Your Teddy's in the Principal's Office (2020) written by Jancee Dunn

Selected Links

Nichols, Lee ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Young Adult

Lee Nichols was born in Marblehead MA and raised in Santa Barbara CA. She lives with her family in Yarmouth ME.

She attended Hampshire College in Amherst MA where she studied history and psychology.

Bibliography

Adult Books

  • Tales of a Drama Queen (2004)
  • Hand-Me-Down (c2005)
  • True Lies of a Drama Queen (2006)
  • Wednesday Night Witches (c2007)
  • Reconstructing Brigid (c2008)

Young Adult Books

  • Deception: a Haunting Emma Novel (2010)

Selected Links

Obed, Ellen (1944 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Poetry

Ellen Bryan Obed is a native of Waterville and lives in Old Town. She is an children's book author and a poet.

She studied biology at the University of Maine, and taught for several years at Inuit, Innu and settler schools in Labrador, Canada.

Her book Borrowed Black has been adapted to the stage and performed by the internationally-known Mermaid Theatre of Canada.

Bibliography

  • Borrowed Black (1979)
  • Little Snowshoe (1984)
  • Wind in My Pocket (c1990)
  • A Letter from the Snow (c1999) (Winner of the Maine Writer's and Publisher's Alliance Chapbook Award for Literature)
  • Wind Dance (1999)
  • Partridgeberry, Redberry, Lingonberry, too (c2008)
  • Who Would Like a Christmas Tree? (2009)
  • Twelve Kinds of Ice (2012) illus. by Barbara McClintock

Selected Links

Northrup, Christiane (1949 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Christiane Northrup is a medical doctor and author who lives in Yarmouth, ME.

She is internationally famous for her books and PBS specials on women's health.

She received her M.D. from Dartmouth Medical School in 1975 and had a private practice in obstetrics and gynecology in Portland and Yarmouth from 1979 to 2005.

Bibliography

  • Women's bodies, women's wisdom : creating physical and emotional health and healing (1994)
  • The new ways women over 40 are healing their symptoms (c1997)
  • A healthy woman's life : Dr. Christiane Northrup's seven-step program to creating health daily (c1998)
  • The wisdom of menopause : creating physical and emotional health and healing during the change (2001)
  • Mother-daughter wisdom : creating a legacy of physical and emotional health (c2005)
  • The wisdom of menopause journal : your guide to creating vibrant health and happiness in the second half of your life (2007)
  • The secret pleasures of menopause (c2008)
  • The secret pleasures of menopause playbook : a guide to creating vibrant health through pleasure (c2009)

Selected Links

Padian, Maria ( - )

Genre: Young Adult

Maria Padian was born in New York, grew up in New Jersey and lives in Brunswick, ME.

She received her B.A. from Middlebury College in Vermont and her master's from the University of Virgina.

She has been a news reporter for a radio station in Charlottevsville, VA, held several reporting jobs in Washington, D.C. and was a press secretary for a member of Congress.

She writes novels for young adults.

Bibliography

  • Brett McCarthy : Work in Progress c2008
  • Out of Nowhere (2013)
  • Wrecked (2016)
  • How to Build a Heart (2020)

Page, Gail (1950 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Gail Page was born in Sag Harbor, NY in 1950. She graduated from the Fashion Institute of Technology in 1970 and worked in New York designing dresses and embroidered patches. She moved to Brooklin, ME in 1974.

Bibliography

  • How to Be a Good Dog (2006)
  • Bobo and the New Neighbor (2008)

Selected Links

Parker, Neal (1956 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories, Young Adult

Neal Parker was born in Brooklyn, NY in 1956. As a teenager, he began sailing traditional sea craft, becoming a licensed captain at the age of 20. He has skippered several schooners and other traditional craft and has had a career as a ship restorer and model ship builder.

He has authored several books, fiction and non-fiction, for children and adults.

Selected Bibliography

  • Wendameen : the Life of an American Schooner from 1912 to the Present (2002)
  • The Fisherman of Kinsale, or the Adventure of Barney O'Reirdon (2006)
  • The Lobsterman and the U.F.O. : a Story in Three Parts (2006)
  • The Butcher's Pig (2007)
  • The Strange Perils of Ruth and Hawkins. Book 1, The Blue Lobster (2007)

Children's Books

  • Captain Annabel (2004)

Selected Links

Perkins, Jack (1933 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Jack Perkins is a former journalist and newscaster who lived for many years on Bar Island in Acadia National Park. He is known for his work on A&E's Biography as well as narration and voiceovers for films and video. He now considers himself to be a "poetographer" combining his love of poetry and photography.

Selected Bibliography

  • Parasols of Fern: a Book About Wonder (1994)
  • Acadia: Visions and Verse (1999)
  • Island Prayershttp://www.jackperkins.com/islandprayers/about.html
  • Finding Moosewood, Finding God: What Happened When a TV Newsman Abandoned His Career for Life on an Island (2013)

Selected Links

Perrow, Angeli ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Angeli Perrow is a children's author who was born in Rockland and lives in Hampden, ME.

She is a teacher who taught elementary school for eleven years, most recently teaching art to children in grades 3 through 5.

Bibliography

  • Captain's Castaway (1998)
  • Lighthouse Dog to the Rescue (2000)
  • Sirius the Dog Star (2002)
  • Many Hands: a Penobscot Indian Story (2010)
  • Celtic Tide (2012)

Peterson, Dawn ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Children's book illustrator Dawn Peterson lives in Falmouth.

Bibliography

  • Baxter Bear and Moses Moose by Evariste Bernier(1990)
  • L.L. Bear's Island Adventure by Kate Rowinski (1992)
  • Ellie Bear and the Fly-away Fly by Kate Rowinski(1993)
  • Mabel Takes the Ferry by Emily Chetkowski (1995)
  • Amasa Walker's Splendid Garment by Emily Chetkowski (1996)
  • Mabel Takes a Sail by Emily Chetkowski (2000)
  • The Orphan Seal by Fran Hodgkins (2000)
  • Miss Ren?e's Mice by Elizabeth Stokes Hoffman (2001)
  • Pumpkin Smile by Emily Chetkowski (2001)
  • Mabel Takes the Ferry by Emily Chetkowski (2001)
  • Miss Ren?e's Mice Go to an Exhibition by Elizabeth Stokes Hoffman (2003)
  • Helen, Ethel & the Crazy Quilt : Based on the 1890 Letters Between Helen Keller and Ethel Orr by Nancy Orr Johnson Jensen (2007)

Pilote, Mary ( - )

Genre: Mystery

Mary Pilote lives on the coast of Maine and is the author of a well-received mystery novel, the first of a projected series.

Bibliography

  • House of Bone (2001)

Plunkett, J. Terry (1938 - 1998)

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Terry Plunkett was a teacher, poet, author and literary critic from Hallowell, ME.

He was born in South Bend, Indiana. He received his bachelor's and master's degrees from Notre Dame and his doctorate in English Literature from the University of Minnesota (1969).

He taught English and other liberal arts subjects at the University of Maine at Augusta from 1969 until he retired as a full professor in 1997. He was named Professor Emeritus of English at UMA in 1998 and in 1999, a collection of books and videos by and about Maine authors at UMA's Katz Library was named for him.

He was a widely-published poet, literary critic and editor of Kennebec: a Portfolio of Writing for 15 years.

Selected Bibliography

  • Touching Ground (1984)
  • A Book I Love (2007)

Selected Links

Pollet, Sylvester (1939 - 2007)

Genre: Poetry

Poet, teacher, editor, sailor and Buddhist Sylvester Pollet was born in Woodstock, NY and lived in Ellsworth, ME.

He received his degree in English from Dartmouth in 1961, lived in New York City, then moved to Maine in 1971 where he received his masters degree from the University of Maine at Orono in 1985.

He taught creative writing at UMO, served as associate editor of the National Poetry Foundation, and edited his own Backwoods Broadside Chaplets, a series of broadsides which celebrated poets from all over the world.

Selected Bibliography

  • Entering the Walking Stick Business: Poems (1982)

Pottle, Robert ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Poetry

Robert Pottle grew up in Eastport and lives in Levant, ME.

He attended Ithaca College and graduated from the University of Maine at Farmington studying elementary education and writing, then becoming an elementary school teacher in Eastbrook, ME.

He began seriously writing for children in 2000 creating Giggle, Giggle, Snicker Laugh, a popular children's poetry website.

In 2001, he began Blue Lobster Press in order to make his children's poetry available in print. That same year, he began performing his poetry at schools, conferences and libraries.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine, the Way Life Is : a Year of Wicked Good Poetry : Poems (2001)
  • Moxie Day and Family : a Laugh and Learn Book of Poetry (2002)
  • Moxie Day the Prankster : Another Laugh and Learn Book of Poetry (2005)
  • Maine : the Way Wildlife Should Be : a Wicked Good Book of Verse (2005)
  • Tinkle, tinkle, little tot : songs & rhymes for toilet training (2005)
  • I'm Allergic to School! (2007)

Selected Links

Probert, Randall ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Randall Probert is a retired Maine game warden who was stationed in the Matagamon region for many years. His books reflect his experiences and many are based on actual occurrences.

Bibliography

  • A Forgotten Legacy: the Matagamon Region (1998)
  • An Eloquent Caper (1999)
  • Courier des Bois (Woods Ranger) (2000)
  • Katrina's Valley (2001)
  • Mysteries at Matagamon Lake (2003)
  • A Warden's Worry (2005)
  • A Quandry at Knowles Corner (2007)
  • Trial at Norway Dam (2009)
  • Train to Barnjum (2012)

Provencher-Faucher, Doris ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Biddeford native Doris Provencher-Faucher is a writer of historical French Canadian/Franco-American fiction and a retired high school teacher -- she taught for 17 years at Biddeford High School.

She received both her undergraduate and graduate degrees (Education) from the University of Maine.

Provencher-Faucher became interested in researching Franco-American history while living in France for a year while her husband was working for NATO.

She has taught courses in French-Canadian/Franco-American Heritage at the University of Maine?s local Senior College.

Bibliography

  • The Virgin Forest: a Novel (2000)
  • The Rapids: a Novel (2002)
  • Imperial Conflict: a Novel (2006)
  • Imperial Conquest: a Novel (2009)

Retzlaff, Kay ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Kay Retzlaff was born and raised in Nebraska and received her undergraduate and graduate degrees from the University of Nebraska. She is an associate professor of English at University College, Bangor -- a campus of the University of Maine at Augusta. She lives in Winterport, ME.

She originally moved to Belfast, ME in the 1980's, but spent ten years in Washington D. C. only moving back to Maine in 1993.

She earned her PhD at the University of Maine in 2004 and teaches composition, professional writing, mythology, women's studies and American Literature. She has also taught ESL classes at the Intensive English Institute, as well as classes in the Modern Languages and Classics, and an honors class at the University of Maine.

Her research centers on Celtic studies -- Irish history and mythology.

Bibliography

  • Ireland: It's Myths and Legends (1998)
  • Women of Mythology (1999)
  • Creating the World of the T?in Through the Remsc?la : Prologemena [sic] to Reading (Thesis) (2004)

Richardson, Beth (1957 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Beth Richardson was born in Rockland and grew up in Portland. She is an assistant professor of Business Administration at St. Joseph's College in Standish and lives in Cape Elizabeth, ME.

She graduated from Deering High School in 1975 and is a graduate of Bowdoin College (BA magna cum laude) and The American University Washington College of Law (JD cum laude).

She became a Master Gardener in 1993.

Bibliography

  • Gardening with Children (1998)

Robinson, Roxana ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

Roxana Barry Robinson was born in Kentucky, grew up in Pennsylvania, makes the Upper East Side of NYC her home, and summers in Northeast Harbor, ME.

She graduated from Buckingham Friends School, in Lahaska, and from The Shipley School, in Bryn Mawr. She attended Bennington College where she studied with Bernard Malamud and Howard Nemerov. She received a B.A. degree in English Literature from the University of Michigan.

Robinson's work has been compared to that of author John Cheever by The New York Times, and to Edith Wharton?s work by Time Magazine. It has appeared in several magazines, including The New Yorker, Harper's, and The Atlantic. Her work has also appeared in Best American Short Stories and has been widely anthologized and broadcast on National Public Radio. Four of her works have been chosen Notable Books of the Year by The New York Times, and she was named a Literary Lion by The New York Public Library.

Bibliography

  • Summer Light (1988)
  • Georgia O'Keefe: a Life (1989)
  • A Glimpse of Scarlet and other stories (1991)
  • This is My Daughter: a Novel (1998)
  • Sweetwater: a Novel (2003)
  • A Perfect Stranger and other stories (2005)
  • Cost (2008)

Ross, Joel (1968 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Joel N. Ross lives in Yarmouth with his wife, writer Lee Nichols.

Bibliography

  • Double Cross Blind (2005)
  • White Flag Down (2007)

Sawyer-Fay, Rebecca ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Gardener and garden-writer Rebecca Sawyer-Fay lives in Camden, ME.

She has worked as an editor for Yachting and The New Yorker and has written articles for House Beautiful, Country Living, Better Homes and Gardening, Organic Gardening and Down East.

Bibliography

  • New Country Kitchens (1995)
  • Gardens Maine Style (2001)
  • Gardens Maine Style Act II (2008)

Schulz, Mona Lisa (1960? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Dr. Mona Lisa Schulz (AKA Dr. Mona Lisa) is a psychic doctor, practicing medical intuitive and author who lives in Yarmouth, ME.

Mona Lisa Schulz MD, PhD received her MD and her PhD in Behavioral Neuroscience from Boston University School of Medicine. She completed her residency in General Psychiatry at Maine Medical Center in Portland, Maine.

In addition to her extensive background in health and brain research, Dr. Schulz has been a practicing medical intuitive for over 20 years. In a medical intuitive consultation, Dr. Schulz explains how a patient's physical and emotion state are linked.

Bibliography

  • Awakening Intuition : Using Your Mind-Body Network for Insight and Healing (1998)
  • The New Feminine Brain : How Women Can Develop Their Inner Strengths, Genius, and Intuition (2005)

Schwartz, Elliott (1936 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Elliott Schwartz is a teacher, composer, musician and writer. He lives in South Freeport, ME.

He was born in 1936 in New York City and received his AB in 1957, his MA in 1958, and his Ed.D in 1962 from Columbia University. He is the Robert K. Beckwith Professor of Music at Bowdoin College, where he has taught since 1964, including twelve years as department chair.

Bibliography

  • The Symphonies of Ralph Vaughan Williams (1964)
  • Music: Ways of Listening (1982)
  • Music Since 1945: Issues, Materials and Literature (1993)
  • Contemporary Composers on Contemporary Music (1998)

Scott, Aurelia ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Aurelia C. Scott lives in Portland, ME where she grows roses and other flowering plants.

She has written for Cottage Living, Garden Design, Fine Gardening, Down East, and the New York Times, among other publications, and is Historical Editor for Garden Compass Magazine. She is also a contributing editor to AudioFile Magazine.

She is the winner of several awards for her writing, including the Writer's Digest Grand Prize and the Garden Writers Association Gold Award for Best Book Writing.

She serves as President of the Board of Portland Trails, a local urban land trust, and as a Master Gardener. She and Robin Whitten, editor at AudioFile Magazine founded the Pink Tulip Project which raises funds for breast cancer research and plants pink tulips in local communities.

Bibliography

  • Otherwise Normal People : Inside the Thorny World of Competitive Rose Gardening (2007)

Scott, Peter (1945 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Peter Scott lives in Chagrin Falls, OH and teaches at the Hawken School, outside of Cleveland. He summers in Isle Au Haut, ME.

Scott is a former Army captain and veteran of the war in Viet Nam. In addition to his books, he has written articles for Down East and Maine Life magazines.

Bibliography

  • Something in the Water (2000)
  • The Boy who Came Walking Home (2003)
  • Barter Island (2007)

Staples, Arthur (1861 - 1940)

Genre: Short Stories

Arthur Gray Staples was born in Bowdoinham in 1861. He received his A.B. at Bowdoin College in 1882, an honorary A. M. in 1919 and Litt.D. in 1923 (also from Bowdoin) and an LL.D. from Bates College in 1923.

He was the city editor of the Bath Daily Times in 1882; city editor (1883-93), managing editor (1893-1919), editor-in-chief (1919-1940) of the Lewiston Journal.

He wrote a daily essay column in the Lewiston Journal called "Just Talks on Common Themes" which were later assembled into book form.

He died in 1940.

Bibliography

  • Just Talks on Common Themes (1919)
  • Jack in the Pulpit (1921)
  • The passing age, by Arthur G. Staples; a collection of familiar essays as published in the newspaper of which the writer is editor-in-chief (1924)

Selected Resources

Strout, Elizabeth ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Pulitzer Prize-winning fiction author Elizabeth Strout was born in Portland, ME and raised in Maine and New Hampshire and lives in New York City.

She graduated from Bates College (Lewiston ME) in 1977 with a degree in English. She received her law degree and a Certificate in Gerontology from Syracuse University.

She moved to New York City where she became an adjunct in the English Department of Borough of Manhattan Community College and she also wrote short stories for Redbook, Seventeen and literary magazines.

She won the 2009 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction for her book Olive Kitteridge.

Bibliography

  • Amy and Isabelle: a Novel (1998)
  • Abide With Me: a Novel (2006)
  • Olive Kitteridge (2008)
  • The Burgess Boys: A Novel (2013)

Adams, David (1946 - )

Genre: Poetry

David Adams has lived in Maine for much of his life. His poetry often reflects the Maine landscape.

Selected Bibliography

  • The laborer's dream : poems 1976
  • First light : new poems 2001

Alvord, Douglas ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator, Non-Fiction

Artist Douglas Alvord specializes in painting ships and other marine scenes. His illustrations of Maine boats may be seen at the Maine Maritime Museum as well as in his books. In addition to his non-fiction works on sailing, he has illustrated children's books by Maine author Sarah Orne Jewett

Selected Bibiolgraphy

Adult Titles

  • On the water: the romance and lore of America's small boats (1988)
  • Beachcruising: an illustrated guide to the boats, gear, navigation techniques, cuisine, and comforts of small boat cruising (1992)

Children's Titles

  • The country of the pointed firs by Sarah Orne Jewett (1991)
  • The white heron : a story by Sarah Orne Jewett (1990)
  • Sarah's boat : a young girl learns the art of sailing story and illustrations by Douglas Alvord (1994)

Selected Resources

Andrews, Ryan ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Ryan Andrews of Falmouth, ME has written three novels.

Selected Bibliogrpahy

  • Land of hope 2002 a man stumbles on the secret of what happened to the lost colony of Roanoke when he searches for his missing wife
  • Sunset 2000
  • Tales of two men 2000

Hill, Joe (1973 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Horror

Joe Hill, son of Maine authors Tabitha and Stephen King writes horror novels and short stories. He lives in New Hampshire with his wife and children.

Selected Bibliography

  • Better Than Home, 1999
  • 20th Century Ghosts, 2007
  • Heart-Shaped Box, 2007
  • Locke and Key, 2008
  • Horns 2010
  • Road Rage (2012) with Stephen King
  • NOS4A2: A Novel (2013)
  • The Fireman (2016)
  • Strange Weather: Four Short Novels (2017)
  • Full Throttle: Stories (2019)

Selected Resources

Macdougall, Arthur (1896 - 1984)

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Arthur Macdougall was born in Enfield, Maine, in 1896. He wrote hunting and fishing stories for Field and Stream. They were collected and published. His main character was a Maine guide named Dud Dean. Macdougall was an ordained minister, he served the Congregational Church in Bingham for many years.

Selected bibliography

Dud Dean stories

  • Dud Dean yarns 1934
  • Dud Dean and his country 1946
  • Doc Blakesley, angler 1949
  • Dud Dean and the enchanted 1954
  • Dud Dean Maine guide : tales of hunting and fishing 1974
  • Adventure in a Model T and other Dud Dean stories 1980
  • If it returns with scars : Dud Dean stories 1981

Poetry

  • Far enough for all the years, poems 1948
  • The Old Lake Road 1977

Selected Resources

Meade, Holly (1956 - 2013)

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Holly Meade, Maine artist, children's book author and illustrator, lives in Sedgewick. She has twice been published in Raising Readers stories for Maine children. She won the 1996 Caldecott Award.

Selected bibliography

Author and Illustrator

  • A place to sleep 2001
  • The rabbit's bride by the Brothers Grimm retold 2001
  • John Willy and Freddy McGee 2003 Charlotte Zolotow Award for Creative Writing
  • Inside, inside, inside 2005

Illustrator

  • Hush! : a Thai lullabyby Minfong Ho 1996 Caldecott winner
  • Cocoa ice by Diana Appelbaum c1997
  • Blue Bowl Down by C.M. Millen 2004
  • Hop! by Phyllis Root 2005
  • On the farm by David Elliott 2008 Rhyming tour through the family farm
  • Peek! : a Thai hide-and-seek by Minfong Ho 2004 In the Thai jungle, a father plays peek-a-boo with his baby daughter - and all the animals
  • Quack! by Phyllis Root 2005
  • Rata-pata-scata-fata : a Caribbean story by Phillis Gershator c2005
  • Sky sweeper by Phillis Gershator 2007 a tale of Takeboki, a Flower Keeper, honors those who take joy in their work
  • Virginnie's hat by Dori Chaconas 2007

Selected resources

Smith, Harry ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Harry W. Smith lives in Camden, ME with wife. He is a miniaturist, author, illus, goldsmith, sculptor.

Selected bibliography

Children's books

  • ABCs of Maine 1980
  • ABC's of New Hampshire 1984
  • Michael and the Mary Day 1979

Adult books

  • The art of making furniture in miniature 1982
  • Windjammers of the Maine coast 1983

Selected resources

Coughlin, Thomas ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Thomas (Tom) E. Coughlin has written a number of self-published books set in Maine. Most his works explore coming of age issues.

Selected Bibliogrpahy

  • Brian Kelly, Route 1 c2001
  • Maggie May's diary c1998
  • Miss O'Malley's Maine summer c2007
  • The odyssey of Sheba Smith c2003

Cost, Matthew ( - )

Genre: Mystery, Non-Fiction

Matthew Langdon Cost is an author who lives in Brunswick, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mainely power 2001
  • Mainely fear 2005
  • Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain and the Civil War: At Every Hazard (2015)
  • I Am Cuba: Fidel Castro and the Cuban Revolution (2020)

Corrigan, Paul ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet Paul Corrigan uses the imagery from his youth in northern Maine in many of his poems. He has also worked as a whitewater rafting guide and as a teacher.

Selected bibliography

  • At the grave of the inknown river driver 1992
  • Waiting for the spring freshet 1984
  • A Terse set 1976 with Paul Acker and Marlene Youmans

Cooke, Carolyn (1959 - )

Genre: Short Stories

Carolyn Cooke an award winning short story author grew up on the coast of Maine. She holds a BA from Smith College and an MFA from Columbia University and is the recipient of an award from the National Endowment for the Arts as well as other honors. She now teaches writing in California.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Bostons 2001 winner of the 2002-2004 PEN/ Bingham Award for a first book, a runner up for the PEN/Hemingway Award, a finalist for the PEN/Winship Award

Selected Resources

Sayen, Murad ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Murad Sayen (AKA David Stockton) lives in South Paris, ME and is a practicing artist -- a painter and a photographer -- as well as a writer. He is also a highly-skilled craftsman, renowned as a knifemaker, who made one-of-a-kind "art knives."

He has a degree in philosophy of ethics from Penn State University.

Bibliography

Written as Murad Sayen

  • Maine : guess where from the air (2007) photographs by Charles Feil,text by Murad Sayen
  • Maine, the home place (2003)

Written as Derek Stockton

  • Above and Beyond: a novel (2000)

Selected Links

Stockton, David ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Karkow, Kristy (1937 - )

Genre: Poetry

Kirsty Karkow came to poetry late in life. She was born in 1937 in London, England and was raised in the British West Indies and Arizona.

She was educated as a medical entomologist and has had many varied interests including sculpting, horse dressage, car-rallying with her classic Austin Healey and teaching Tai Chi.

It was only after she and her husband retired to the coast of Maine that she began writing the haiku for which she has won the R. H. Blyth Award and the Mainichi Haiku contest.

Bibliography

  • Water poems : haiku, tanka, and sijo (2005)
  • Shorelines : haiku, haibun, and tanka (2007)

Cunnane, Kelly ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Beals, ME resident Kelly Cunnane is a writer and educator who is greatly influenced by the many different countries and cultures where she has lived and taught.

She has an MA in English/Creative Nonfiction and has published in Down East, Christian Science Monitor,as well as various anthologies and children's picture books with Simon & Schuster, Random House, and Heinemann International.

Before marriage and a family, Cunnane was a Peace Corps volunteer, teaching English as a second language, in countries such as China, Africa and South America. She and her family went back to live for a year in the Kenyan village in which she had served in the Peace Corps. When they returned, they brought a Kenyan boy with them as an exchange student who lived with them in Beals and assisted Kelly in producing a play at Beals Elementary School.

In September of 2008, she took a teaching position in the West African country of Mauritania and stayed there for a year until the tumultuous political situation prompted her to return home.

Using her diverse cultural experiences, she creates workshops for children where the use of drama, art and writing helps them to learn about African cultures.

Bibliography

  • For you are a Kenyan child (2006)winner, 2006 Ezra Jack Keats New Writer Award

Selected Links

Kestenbaum, Stuart (1952 - )

Genre: Poetry

Deer Isle resident Stuart Kestenbaum has lived in Maine since 1974. He is a poet and was the director of the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, also located on Deer Isle, for 27 years from 1988 to 2015

Selected Bibliography

  • Only Now Poems (2014)
  • Pilgrimage (1990) gelatin monoprints by Susan B. Webster
  • House of thanksgiving : a collection of poems (2003)
  • Prayers & run-on sentences : poems (2007)
  • The View from Here: Craft, Community and the Creative Process (2012)

Selected Links

Kline, Christina (1964 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Christina Baker Kline lives with her family in Montclair NJ and summers on Mount Desert Island, ME.

She has degrees from Yale, Cambridge and the University of Virginia where she was a Henry Hoyns Fellow in Fiction Writing. She has been a teacher of both fiction and non-fiction writing, poetry, English Literature, literary theory and women's studies at Yale, New York and Drew Universities and recently received a Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation Fellowship. She is the Writer-in-Residence at Fordham University. She has worked as a personal chef, caterer and cook both on the coast of Maine and in Virginia.

Bibliography

  • Sweet water (1993)
  • The conversation begins : mothers and daughters talk about living feminism (1996)
  • Child of mine : writers talk about the first year of motherhood (editor) (1997)
  • Desire lines : a novel (1999)
  • The way life should be (2007)
  • About face : women write about what they see when they look in the mirror (editor, with Anne Burt)(2008)
  • Bird in Hand (2009)
  • Orphan Train: A Novel (2013)
  • A Piece of the World: A Novel (2017)
  • The Exiles: A Novel (2020)

Kotzwinkle, William (1938 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction, Poetry, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Short Stories

William Kotzwinkle was born in Scranton PA in 1938 and has a home in Seal Cove, ME.

He attended Rider College and Pennsylvania State University, worked as a short-order cook, then an editor/writer during the 1960's then as a full-time writer. He has won the National Magazine awards for fiction in 1972 and 1975; the O Henry Prize in 1975; the World Fantasy Award for Best Novel in 1977; the North Dakota Children's Choice Award in 1983; and the Buckeye Award, 1984.

He wrote the novelization of the film E.T. the Extraterrestrial (1982).

Selected Bibliography

  • Hermes 3000 (1972)
  • The Fan Man (1974)
  • Night-Book (1974)
  • Swimmer in the Secret Sea (1975)
  • Doctor Rat (1976)
  • Fata Morgana (1977)
  • Herr Nightingale and the Satin Woman (1978)
  • Jack in the Box (1980) published as Book of Love (1990)
  • Christmas at Fontaine's (1982)
  • E.T., the Extra-Terrestrial Storybook (juvenile, novelization of screenplay by Melissa Mathison) (1982)
  • Superman III (novelization of screenplay by David and Leslie Newman) (1983)
  • Queen of Swords (1983)
  • E.T., the Storybook of the Green Planet: A New Storybook (juvenile, based on story by Steven Spielberg) (1985)
  • The Exile (1987)
  • The Midnight Examiner (1989)
  • Hot Jazz Trio (1989)
  • The Game of Thirty (1994)
  • The Bear Went over the Mountain (1996)
  • The Fireman (1969)
  • The Ship That Came Down the Gutter (1970)
  • Elephant Boy: A Story of the Stone Age (1970)
  • The Day the Gang Got Rich (1970)
  • The Return of Crazy Horse (1971)
  • The Supreme, Superb, Exalted, and Delightful, One and Only Magic Building (1973)
  • Up the Alley with Jack and Joe (1974)
  • The Leopard's Tooth (1976)
  • The Ants Who Took Away Time (1978)
  • Dream of Dark Harbor (1979)
  • The Nap Master (1979)
  • The World Is Big and I'm So Small (1986)
  • The Empty Notebook (1990)
  • The Million Dollar Bear (1994)

Short Stories

  • Elephant Bangs Train (1971)
  • The Oldest Man, and Other Timeless Stories (juvenile) (1971)
  • Trouble in Bugland: A Collection of Inspector Mantis Mysteries (juvenile) (1983)
  • Jewel of the Moon (1985)
  • Hearts of Wood, and Other Timeless Tales (juvenile) (1986)
  • Tales from the Empty Notebook (juvenile) (1996)

Poetry

  • Great World Circus (juvenile) (1983)
  • Seduction in Berlin (1985)

Armstrong, Jennifer (1961 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Poetry

Jennifer Armstrong, a poet and musician, lives in Belfast Maine. She plays the bagpipes and fiddle to accompany her story telling and leads works shops.

Selected bibliography

  • The Poet's Basket 2006
  • Anything Is Possible 2006
  • The Generosity of Hope: 20 Poems of Possibility 1999

Selected Resources

Website

Ashley, Cliff (1913 - 1998)

Genre: Non-Fiction

As an adult, Cliff Ashley lived in Falmouth Maine from where he wrote regularly to his brother Ed. These letter which chronicled small town life in New England in the early part of the 20th Century were eventually gathered and edited.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Ed Letters: Memories of a New England Boyhood (2001) Edited by Diane DeManbey Duebber

Baker, Marybeth ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Author and illustrator MaryBeth Baker has written a series of children's books about a Maine moose.

Selected Bibliography

  • The adventures of Maynard ... a Maine moose 1984
  • The adventures of Maynard and the loon 1985
  • Maynard's Allagash friends 1989

Baldwin, Robert (1934 - 2007)

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's author, Robert F. Baldwin, lived in southern Maine where he could enjoy his love of the sea. Born during the great depression, he was a reporter for most of his professional life, and a storyteller for all of it. He died in 2007.

Selected Bibliography

  • New England whaler 1996
  • This is the Sea that Feeds Us 1998
  • The Fish House Door 2010

Barlow, Elizabeth ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Eleanor Poe Barlow, a retired teacher and Dicken's expert lives in Friendship Maine. Barlow taught for many years at Gad's Hill School, which was in a home that originally belonged to Charles Dickens in Kent England.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Master's Cat: the story of Charles Dickens as told by his cat 1998

Batignani, Karen ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Karen Batignani explores the spiritual history of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Exploring the spirit of Maine: a seeker's guide 2005
  • Maine's coastal cemeteries : a historic tour

Bayer, Robert ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Robert Bayer is the Director of the Lobster Institute. In addition to scholarly articles, he has written a children's book on lobsters.

Selected Bibliography

  • Evaluation of an experimental filter medium for water re-use systems with John Riley and David Cole
  • Lobsters inside-out : a guide to the Maine lobster a children's book on lobsters

Selected Resources

Beach, Judi (1947 - 2008)

Genre: Children's Literature, Poetry

Judi Beach poet and author hosted a poetry show on WERU radio in East Orland, Maine. She was born Nov. 26, 1947, in Cincinnati, Ohio and died April 21, 2008 in her home in Maine. She was active in the International Women's Writing Guild.

Selected Bibliography

  • How far light must travel: poems 2007
  • Names for snow 2003 a picture book illustrated by Loretta Krupinski
  • Wild: poems 2006

Selected Resources

LaFlamme, Mark ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Horror, Non-Fiction

Journalist and novelist Mark LaFlamme is a reporter and columnist for the Lewiston Sun Journal and lives in Lewiston, ME.

He was awarded the Journalist of the Year Award by the Maine Press Association in 2006.

Bibliography

  • The Pink Room (2005)
  • Asterisk:[Red Sox 2086] (2006)
  • Vegetation (2007)
  • Dirt: An American Campaign (2008)

Lamanda, Al ( - )

Genre: Mystery

Al Lamanda is a former New Yorker who lives in Raymond, ME and writes well-reviewed mystery/thrillers.

He was born in the Bronx. He studied security management at New York University, fire safety at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and has a degree in interview/interrogation techniques. He has been both a private investigator and a security consultant, as well as worked as security director for several major corporations.

Bibliography

  • Dunstan Falls 2008
  • Walking Homeless 2010
  • Sunset (2012)

Jensen, Nancy ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Nancy Orr Johnson Jensen grew up on Bailey Island and wrote histories of it. She received her teaching degree from Gorham Teacher's College (now University of Southern Maine.) On the advice of Senator Margaret Chase Smith, she taught overseas for the Department of Defense. She currently lives and teaches in Illinois.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bailey Island : memories, pictures & lore 2003
  • Helen, Ethel & the crazy quilt: based on the 1890 letters between Helen Keller and Ethel Orr 2007

Irland, Lloyd ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Lloyd C Irland, economist and forester, lives in Wayne, Maine. He has written extensively in both fields. Among other employment, Irland ahs lectured at the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies and has served the State of Maine in both the Forest Service and the State Planning Office. He is the founder and director of the Irland Group, a consulting firm.

Selected Bibliography

  • Are Maine's budget woes over?: thinking about the coming century 1998
  • Ecosystem management in northern forests: potential role in managing the carbon cycle 1995
  • The Northeast's changing forest 1999
  • Northeastern paper mill towns economic trends and economic development responses 2001
  • Professional Ethics for Natural Resource and Environmental Managers: A Primer 2007

Selected Resources

Lasky, Kathryn (1944 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Young Adult

Prolific author Kathryn Lasky was born and raised in Indiana, lives in Cambridge MA and summers on an island off the coast of Maine. She received her degree in English from the University of Michigan. Lasky worked for a fashion magazine and as a teacher before devoting herself to writing full time.

She writes mostly fiction for children and young adults, though she has written some children's non-fiction and some adult fiction.

Her Guardians of Ga'Hoole series of young adult novels about a society of owls has become very popular and has been adapted into a major motion picture.

Bibliography

Camp Princess Series

  • Born to Rule (2006)
  • Unicorns? Get Real! (2007)

The Royal Diaries Series

  • Elizabeth I: Red Rose of the House of Tudor, England 1544 (1999)
  • Marie Antoinette: Princess of Versailles, Austria-France 1769 (2000)
  • Mary, Queen of Scots: Queen Without a Country, France 1553 (2002)
  • Jahanara: Princess of Princesses, India 1627 (2002)
  • Kazunomiya: Prisoner of Heaven, Japan 1858 (2004)

Dear America Series

  • Journey to the New World: The Diary Of Remember Patience Whipple, Mayflower, 1620 (1996)
  • Dreams in the Golden Country: The Diary of Zipporah Feldman a Jewish Immigrant Girl, New York City, 1903 (1998)
  • Christmas After All: The Great Depression Diary of Minnie Swift, Indianapolis, Indiana, 1932 (2001)
  • A Time for Courage:The Suffragette Diary of Kathleen Bowen, Washington, D.C., 1917 (2002)

My Name Is America Series

  • The Journal of Augustus Pelletier: Lewis and Clark Expedition, 1804 (2000)

My America Series

  • Hope In My Heart, Sofia's Ellis Island Diary (Book One) (2003)
  • Home at Last: Sofia's Immigrant Diary (Book Two) (2003)
  • An American Spring: Sofia's Immigrant Diary (Book Three) (2004)

Portraits Series

  • Dancing Through Fire (2005)

Daughters of the Sea Series

  • Book #1: Hannah (2009)

Starbuck Family Adventures

  • Double Trouble Squared (1991)
  • Shadows in the Water (1992)
  • A Voice in the Wind (1993)

Guardians of Ga'Hoole Series

  • The Capture (2003)
  • The Journey (2003)
  • The Rescue (2004)
  • The Siege (2004)
  • The Shattering (2004)
  • The Burning (2004)
  • The Hatchling (2005)
  • The Outcast (2005)
  • The First Collier (2006)
  • The Coming of Hoole (2006)
  • To Be a King (2006)
  • The Golden Tree (2007)
  • The River of Wind (2007)
  • Exile (2008)
  • The War of the Ember (2008)
  • Guardians of Ga'Hoole:A Guide To the Great Tree (2010)
  • Guardians of Ga'Hoole: Lost Tales of Ga'Hoole (2010)

Wolves Of The Beyond Series

  • Book 1: Lone Wolf (2010)

Stand alone titles

  • Beyond the Divide (1983)
  • The Night Journey (1986)
  • Pageant (1986)
  • Prank (1986)
  • The Bone Wars (1988)
  • Beyond the Burning Time (1994)
  • True North (1996)
  • Alice Rose and Sam (1998)
  • Star Split (1999)
  • Blood Secret (2004)
  • Broken Song (2005)
  • The Last Girls of Pompeii (2007)
  • Hawksmaid (2010)
  • Ashes (2010)
  • Chasing Orion (2010)

Children/Young Adults Non-Fiction

  • Sugaring Time (1983)
  • A Baby for Max (1984)
  • Traces of Life (1989)
  • Dinosaur Dig (1990)
  • Surtsey: The Newest Place on Earth (1992)
  • Monarchs (1993)
  • Searching for Laura Ingalls (1993)
  • Days of the Dead (1994)
  • The Most Beautiful Roof in the World (1997)
  • Shadows in the Dawn: The Lemurs of Madagascar (1998)
  • Interrupted Journey: Saving Endangered Sea Turtles (2001)
  • John Muir: America's First Environmentalist (2006)
  • Georgia Rises: A Day in the Life of Georgia O'Keeffe (2009)

Picture Books

  • My Island Grandma (1979)
  • Sea Swan (1988)
  • I Have an Aunt on Marlborough Street (1992)
  • Cloud Eyes (1994)
  • The Librarian Who Measured the Earth (1994)
  • The Gates of the Wind (1995)
  • Pond Year (1995)
  • She's Wearing a Dead Bird on Her Head! (1995)
  • Lunch Bunnies (1996)
  • Hercules: The Man, The Myth, The Hero (1997)
  • Marven of the Great North Woods (1997)
  • A Brilliant Streak (1998)
  • Show and Tell Bunnies (1998)
  • Sophie and Rose (1998)
  • The Emperor's Old Clothes (1999)
  • First Painter (1999)
  • Lucille's Snowsuit (2000)
  • Science Fair Bunnies (2000)
  • Vision of Beauty (2000)
  • Born in the Breezes: The Voyages Of Joshua Slocum (2001)
  • Starring Lucille (2001)
  • Porkenstein (2002)
  • Before I was Your Mother (2003)
  • Lucille Camps In (2003)
  • The Man Who Made Time Travel (2003)
  • Mommy's Hands (2003)
  • A Voice of Her Own: The Story of Phillis Wheatley, Slave Poet (2003)
  • Humphrey, Albert, and the Flying Machine (2004)
  • Love That Baby (2004)
  • Tumble Bunnies (2005)
  • Pirate Bob (2006)
  • Two Bad Pilgrims (2009)
  • Poodle and Hound (2009)
  • Felix Takes the Stage (2010)

Adults

  • Trace Elements (1986) (as Kathryn Lasky Knight)
  • The Widow of Oz (1989) (as Kathryn Lasky Knight)
  • Mortal Words (1990) (as Kathryn Lasky Knight)
  • Mumbo Jumbo (1991) (as Kathryn Lasky Knight)
  • Dark Swan (1994) (as Kathryn Lasky Knight)
  • Night Gardening (1999) (written under the pseudonym of E.L. Swann)

Dudman, Martha ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Martha Todd Dudman, a resident of Northeast Bay, Maine, has written about the challenges of motherhood. In addition to her writing, Dudman has supported herself and her two children as a teacher and by running a radio station.

Selected Bibliography

Non-Fiction

  • Augusta, Gone:a true story 2001 Janet Maslin of the New York Times, in a review wrote "...a wrenching mother's-eye view of the kind of family crisis seen...in countless households where teenagers find chemical means of amplifying the rebelliousness they already feel."
  • Expecting to Fly: a sixties reckoning 2004 autobiography

Fiction

  • Black Olives 2008 a novel
  • Dawn 1989 short stories

Selected Resources

Farrar, Charles ( - 1893)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Charles A.J. Farrar wrote Maine guide books in the 19th century.

Selected Bibliography

  • Down the west branch : or Camps and tramps around Katahdin 1886
  • Eastward, ho! : or, adventures at Rangeley Lakes 1883
  • Farrar's illustrated guide book to Moosehead Lake, Katahdin iron works and vicinity 1890
  • Farrar's Illustrated guide book to the Androscoggin lakes 1887
  • From lake to lake; or, a trip across country: a narrative of the wilds of Maine 1887
  • Up the north branch: or, A summer's outing 1889

Hall, Meredith (1949 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Meredith Hall a professor at the University of New Hampshire has written about growing up in Maine. Born in 1949, Hall graduated from Bowdoin College at the age of 44. She subsequently she won the $50,000 Gift of Freedom Award from A Room of Her Own Foundation, which allowed her the freedom to write her memoir. Her essays have appeared in the New York Times, a number of literary journals and several anthologies. She has won the Pushcart Prize.

Selected Bibliography

  • Without a map 2007

Igo, Chuck ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Chuck Igo, a DJ On Portland?s WYNZ-FM has written a novel.

Selected Bibliography

  • Taken identity 2007

Selected Resources

Garden, Nancy (1938 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's author Nancy Garden splits her time between her homes in Maine and Massachusetts. Garden has worked as in theater and as an editor. She has received the American Library Association Margaret A. Edwards Award for lifetime achievement in writing for teens, the Robert B. Downs Intellectual Freedom Award for defending her work against censorship and Katahdin Award for Lifetime Achievement.

Selected Bibliography

  • Annie on my mind 1992 Liza puts aside her feelings for Annie after the disaster at school, but eventually she allows love to triumph over the ignorance of people
  • Endgame 2006 about a school shooting
  • Hear us out!: lesbian and gay stories of struggle, progress and hope, 1950 to the present 2007
  • he year they burned the books 1999

Selected Resources

Hamlin, Ardeana ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Novelist, Ardeana Hamlin also writes for the Bangor Daily News. Her first novel was published under the name Andrea Hamlin Knowles.

Selected Bibliography

  • Pink chimneys: a novel of nineteenth century Maine 1987
  • A dream of Paris 2004

Selected Resources

Hassett, John ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's author, John Hassett collaborates with his wife, Ann. They live on the Maine coast.

Selected Bibliography

  • Can't catch me 2006
  • Cat up a tree 1998
  • Charles of the wild 1997
  • Father Sun, Mother Moon 2001
  • The finest Christmas tree 2005
  • The nine lives of Dudley Dog 2008
  • The three silly girls Grubb 2002

Selected Resources

Hassett, Ann (1958 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's author, Ann Hassett collaborates with her husband John.. They live on the Maine coast.

Selected Bibliography

  • Can't catch me 2006
  • Cat up a tree 1998
  • Charles of the wild 1997
  • Father Sun, Mother Moon 2001
  • The finest Christmas tree 2005
  • The nine lives of Dudley Dog 2008
  • The three silly girls Grubb 2002

Selected Resources

Britain, Kristen ( - )

Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy

Fantasy writer, Kristen Britain lives in a log cabin on Mount Desert Island. She was born, raised and educated in upstate New York.

Selected Bibliography

  • Green rider 1998
  • First rider's call 2003
  • The high king's tomb 2007

Selected Resource

Dacyczyn, Amy ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Amy Dacyczyn of Leeds, Maine wrote, and edited the Tightwad Gazette. Although she has retired from writing the Gazette, Dacyczyn still lives the tightwad lifestyle.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Complete Tightwad Gazette: promoting thrift as a viable alternative lifestyle 1998

Selected Resources

  • Interview conducted 2009 by New Hampshire Public Telelvision

Edwards, Elizabeth ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet, Elizabeth Edwards, lives in Kittery, Maine. Originally from Pittsburgh, she has published poetry in a number of journals including The Southern Review, The Antioch Review and The Florida Review. In 2001, she was the Maine Arts Commission Poetry Fellow.

Selected Bibliography

  • The chronic liar buys a canary 2004

Selected Resources

Hulbert, Elizabeth ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Elizabeth McKey Hulbert is a children's author and illustrator who lives on Mt Desert Island. She has written and painted all of her life.

Selected Bibliography

  • Amos and Hannah: a Maine mystery 2003
  • A fisherman's daughter 1992
  • I love to ski 1986
  • The memory quilt 1988 An orphan boy has a difficult time adjusting to life with his grandparents on a Maine island
  • Milkweed and winkles : a wild child's cookbook 1995

Selected Resources

Lethem, Jonathan (1964 - )

Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy, Short Stories

Jonathan Lethem was born in Brooklyn NY and raised by his painter father and political activist mother.

He graduated from the High School of Music & Art where he had studied to become a visual artist but while there, published his own zine The Literary Exchange and wrote an unpublished novel entitled Heroes.

He entered Bennington College in VT, but dropped out half way through when he discovered that he was more interested in writing than in art.

He hitchhiked to California where he lived for many years and began writing and publishing short stories. He returned to Brooklyn in 1996 where he achieved mainstream success as a novelist. His work tends to cross genres, but names as influences in his life and work the writing of science fiction great Philip K. Dick and the John Ford western film "The Searchers."

He lives in Brooklyn NY and Berwick ME with his family.

Selected Bibliography

  • Gun, with Occasional Music (1994)
  • Amnesia Moon (1995)
  • As She Climbed Across the Table (1997)
  • Girl in Landscape (1998)
  • Motherless Brooklyn (1999)
  • The Fortress of Solitude (2003)
  • You Don't Love Me Yet (2007)
  • Chronic City (2009)
  • Fear of Music (2012)
  • Dissident Gardens: A Novel (2013)
  • Lucky Alan and other Stories (2015)
  • A Gambler's Anatomy: A Novel (2016)
  • More Alive and Less Lonely: On Books and Writers (2017)
  • The Feral Detective (2018)

Howe, Caroline ( - 1907)

Genre: Poetry

Caroline Dana Howe was a poet who lived in 19th century Portland, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ashes for flame: and other poems 1885

Hornidge, Marilis (1932 - 2011)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Marilis Hornidge,died Jan. 20, 2011. She worked as a book reviewer for Courier-Gazette (Rockland) and Maine Antique Digest.

Selected Bibliography

  • Christmas tales 1988
  • That Yankee cat : the Maine coon 1981
  • The Waldoboro Public Library, 1916-1983: a commemorative history 1983

Selected Links

Hobbs, Elizabeth ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet, Elizabeth Hobbs lives in Raymond, Maine. She is a graduate of Bates College.

Selected Bibliography

  • A craving for the goatman 2003
  • Poems from the lake 2001

Selected Resources

Lubner, Susan ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's book author Susan Lubner grew up in Bangor, ME and resides in Massachusetts. She is an alumni of Simmons College and always wanted to be a writer -- she wrote her first story (unpublished) when she was in the second grade.

Bibliography

  • Noises at Night (2005) with Beth Raisner Glass
  • Ruthie Bon Bair: Do Not Go To Bed With Wringing Wet Hair! (2006)
  • A Horse's Tale: A Colonial Williamsburg Adventure (2008)

Hayman, James ( - 2023)

Genre: Mystery

James Hayman is a mystery writer who lives in Portland. He says on his website "I arrived in August 2001, shortly before the 9/11 attacks, in search of the right place to begin a new career as a fiction writer." He also moved his main character to Portland.

Selected Bibliography

  • The chill of night 2010
  • The cutting 2009

Selected Resources

Luttrell, Steve (1947 - )

Genre: Poetry

Steve Luttrell was born, raised, and continues to live, in his hometown of Portland ME.

He graduated from North Yarmouth Academy and then went on to Franklin Pierce College, where he earned a degree in English. He is a poet and is the founder and publishing editor of The Cafe Review a quarterly journal of poetry in existence for over 20 years.

In 2009, he was named Portland's Poet Laureate for a two-year term.

Selected Bibliography

  • The green man and other poems (1990)
  • Conditions : a book of poems (1993)
  • The wasp in the wind : collected haiku (1994)
  • This 'n that : a collection of poems (1995)
  • Outside the circle : poems (1997)
  • Home movies : a collection of poems (1998)
  • Pemaquid and other poems (2000)
  • Twelve moons ; twelve poems (2005)

Selected Links

Lyford, Tom (1946 - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet and essayist Tom Lyford was born in Dover-Foxcroft, Maine, graduated from Foxcroft Academy, and received his B.S. degree in Education (English major, history minor) from Farmington State College (now the University of Maine at Farmington). He then worked as a high school English teacher in various Maine towns, including ten years in Mexico, ME (where he served as English Department Head for six years) and, for the last 23 years of his teaching career, at Foxcroft Academy. He is currently a library clerk at Thompson Free Library in Dover-Foxcroft.

His poems and essays have been published in publications such as Sakana, Bangor Metro, Off the Coast, Wolf Moon Press Journal, Up North, and The Bangor Daily News. Lyford has been a presenting poet at Winter Harbor's Schoodic Arts Festival, has co-read with Belfast's Poet Laureate, Elizabeth Garber, at Bangor's Borders bookstore, was a featured poet at Camden Library's Spring Poetry Series and at Damariscotta's "A Symphony of Poets," and has been a featured reader at The Harlow Gallery in Hallowell, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Pleasant Street : a chapbook of baby boomer ballads & poems (2005)
  • Poetic license (2005)
  • On becoming a man of substance : the adventure (2006)
  • Americana (2006)
  • Kilroy was here, me too (2009)
  • Work aversion trauma : a lifetime of suffering (2009)

Hatlen, Burton (1936 - 2008)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Burt Hatlen, who Stephen King called the "greatest English teacher I ever had" was a poet. Hatlen was born in 1936 in California. Fro the majority of his professional life he taught English at the University of Maine. He was instrumental in the founding and expansion of the National Poetry Foundation. He died in 2008.

Selected Bibliography

  • I wanted to tell you 1988 Poetry
  • William Carlos Williams and the language of poetry edited and with a preface by Burton Hatlen 2002

Selected Resources

Mace, Frances (1836 - 1899)

Genre: Poetry

Frances Parker (Laughton) Mace was born in Orono, ME and lived in Bangor.

Her poetry first appeared in print in the Waterville Mail when she was 12 years old.

She became a wife and mother of eight (four survived) but continued to write, including for the New York Journal of Commerce, Harper's Magazine, The Atlantic, The Century and Scribner's.

Bibliography

  • Legends, Lyrics and Sonnets (1883)
  • Under Pine and Palm (1888)

Manderino, John (1950? - )

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

John Manderino, formerly of Ohio, lives in Buxton, ME, teaches college writing at the University of Southern Maine and acts as a coach and editor for fellow writers.

He has written short stories, novels, plays and a memoir.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sam and His Brother Len (1994)
  • The Man Who Once Played Catch with Nellie Fox: a Novel (1998)
  • Reason for Leaving: Job Stories: a Novel (2001)
  • Crying at Movies: a Memoir (2008)

Manns, Robert (1928? - )

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film

Playwright Robert E. Manns was born in Detroit MI and lives in Camden, ME.

Author of over fifteen full-length and more than thirty one-act plays, Manns studied philosophy and creative writing at Wayne State University. He began his theater career at the World State in Detroit working the light and sound. He then moved to New York City and had two of his one-act plays staged at the White Barn Theater in Westport CT with John Astin as director. Thus began his career as a succesful playwright.

He moved to Florida in 1960 and then to Atlanta GA where he was Director of Callenwolde Art Center (1972-1975) and administrator and teacher at the Atlanta College of Art (1975-1980). He also taught poetry at Emory University.

He is best known for his "The Lincoln Plays, Part I and II" (1994).

Selected Bibliography

  • Lincoln Part I and Lincoln Part II (1995)
  • Night of the frogs & Sautee and Nacoochee (2000)
  • Lincoln in the White House : a play (2001)
  • The rats ; &, The cockroach : two plays (2001)
  • A tripos : & other one-act plays (2002)
  • The Maine quartet : and other one-act plays (2002)
  • Cry the loon & The avian connection : two plays (2003)
  • Boys will be boys & five one-act plays (2005)
  • The swan that slept : a play (2005)
  • Yorktown : a play (2006)

McCreight, Tim (1951 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Born in PA, Tim McCreight is an artist, metalsmith, author and publisher who lives in Harpswell, ME.

He received his BA in sculpture from the College of Wooster (1969-1973) and his MFA in jewelry and metalsmithing. McCreight has taught at the Maine College of Art (1988-2005) and at Worcester Center for Crafts. He has also served on several boards of directors, including that of the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts and of the Society of North American Goldsmiths (SNAG) where he also served as president. He is the founding director and communications officer for the Precious Metal Clay Guild.

In 1985, he founded Brynmorgen Press, a press devoted to filling the void of good, practical textbooks in the art and study of metalwork.

Selected Bibliography

  • Custom knifemaking : 10 projects from a master craftsman (1985)
  • The complete metalsmith : an illustrated handbook (1991)
  • Metals technic : a collection of techniques for metalsmiths (1992)
  • Practical jewelry rendering (1993)
  • Practical casting : a studio reference (1994)
  • Design language (1996)
  • Jewelry : fundamentals of metalsmithing (1997)
  • Working with precious metal clay (2000)
  • The syntax of objects (2005)
  • Practical joining (2006)

Selected Links

Meyer, Louis (1942 - 2014)

Genre: Children's Literature

Louis A. Meyer was born in Johnstown, PA and grew up in PA and FL. He went to college in FL, then served in the Navy during the war in Viet Nam. He received his BA in English Literature from Florida State University (1964) and his MFA in Painting from Boston University's Master of Fine Arts program (1973).

He is most well known for his Jacky Faber books, a series of young adult novels featuring Mary "Jacky" Faber, a young woman who, disguised as a boy, has many adventures at sea.

Meyer is also a painter and owns a gallery called Clair de Loon in Bar Harbor, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bloody Jack: Being an Account of the Curious Adventures of Mary Jacky Faber, Ship's Boy (2002)
  • The Curse of the Blue Tattoo: Being an Account of the Misadventures of Jacky Faber, Midshipman and Fine Lady (2004)
  • Under the Jolly Roger: Being an Account of the Further Nautical Adventures of Jacky Faber (2005)
  • In the Belly of the Bloodhound : Being an Account of a Particularly Peculiar Adventure in the Life of Jacky Faber (2006)
  • Mississippi Jack : Being an Account of the Further Waterborne Adventures of Jacky Faber, Midshipman, Fine Lady, and the Lily of the West (2007)
  • My Bonny Light Horseman : Being an Account of the Further Adventures of Jacky Faber, in Love and War (2008)
  • Rapture of the Deep: Being an Account of the Further Adventures of Jacky Faber, Soldier, Sailor, Mermaid, Spy (2009)
  • The Wake of the Lorelei Lee: Being an Account of the Adventures of Jacky Faber, on her Way to Botany Bay (2010)
  • Viva Jacquelina!: Being an Account of the Further Adventures of Jacky Faber, Over the Hills and Far Away (2012)

Selected Links

Minot, Susan (1956 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Susan Minot was born in Boston, MA and summers on North Haven. She received her BA from Brown University (writing and painting), her MFA from Columbia University School of the Arts (creative writing). She is a novelist, short story writer, poet, and screenwriter and she has won the Prix Femina Etranger (France), the O Henry Prize and a Pushcart Prize for her writing.

Selected Bibliography

Novels and Stories

  • Monkeys (1986)
  • Lust and Other Stories (1989)
  • Folly: A Novel (1993)
  • Evening (1998)
  • Rapture (2002)
  • Thirty Girls (2014)
  • Why I Don't Write and Other Stories (2020)

Screenplays

  • Stealing Beauty With Bernardo Bertolucci. (1996)
  • Evening With Michael Cunningham (2007)

Poetry

  • Poems 4 A.M. (2003)

Lindsay, Johanna (1952 - )

Genre: Romance Novel

Johanna Lindsay is a bestselling romance writer. Lindsay was born in Germany to a military father. She lived much of her life in Hawaii, moving to Maine after being widowed to live near other family members.

Selected Bibliography

Malory-Anderson Family Saga Series

  • Love Only Once (1985) (Regina Ashton/Nicholas Eden)
  • Tender Rebel (1988) (Anthony Malory/Roslynn Chadwick)
  • Gentle Rogue (1990) (James/Georgina Anderson)
  • The Magic of You (1993) (Amy/Warren Anderson)
  • Say You Love Me (1996) (Derek/Kelsey Langton)
  • The Present (1998) (Christopher/Anastasia Stephanoff)
  • A Loving Scoundrel (2004) (Jeremy/Danny)
  • Captive of My Desires (2006) (Drew Anderson/Gabrielle Brooks)
  • No Choice But Seduction (2008) (Boyd Anderson/Katey Tyler)
  • That Perfect Someone (2010) (Richard Allen/Julia Miller)

Ly-San-Ter Family Saga Series

  • Warrior's Woman (1990)
  • Keeper of the Heart (1993)
  • Heart of a Warrior (2001)

Viking Haardrad Family Saga Series

  • Fires of Winter (1980)
  • Hearts Aflame (1987)
  • Surrender My Love (1994)

Selected Resources

Morren, Ruth Axtell ( - )

Genre: Romance Novel

Ruth Axtell Morren writes historical romances and lives in Cutler, ME.

She received her BA in comparative literature from Smith College, taught English for a while, worked as an au pair in the Canary Islands and in international development in Miami FL. It was in Florida where she met her husband, a Dutchman from Suriname, with whom she moved to Holland. She wrote her first recognized novels while living there, the second of which was a finalist in in the Romance Writers of America Golden Heart Contest in 1994. They have since moved to the coast of Maine where she continues to write.

Selected Bibliography

  • Winter is past (2003)
  • Wild Rose (2004)
  • Lilac Spring (2005)
  • Dawn in My Heart (2006)
  • Rogue's Redemption (2008)
  • Hearts in the Highlands (2008)
  • A Man Most Worthy (2008)

Page, Katherine Hall ( - )

Genre: Mystery, Young Adult

Mystery writer Katherine Hall Page was born and raised in New Jersey but her family spend summer vacations on Deer Isle. She received her BA in English from Wellesley College, her Masters in Secondary Education from Tufts and her PhD in Administration, Public Planning and Social Policy from Harvard. She taught high school for a time before she turned to writing full time.

She is an award-winner, beginning with her first book's receiving the 1991 Agatha Award for Best First Mystery Novel.

She lives in Massachusetts.

Bibliography

Faith Fairchild Mystery Series

  • The Body in the Belfry (1991) Agatha Best First Mystery Novel Award
  • The body in the Kelp (c1991)
  • The body in the Bouillon (1991)
  • The body in the Vestibule (1992)
  • The body in the Cast (1993)
  • The body in the Basement (1994)
  • The body in the Bog (c1996)
  • The body in the Fjord (c1997)
  • The body in the Bookcase (1998)
  • The body in the Big Apple (c1999)
  • The body in the Moonlight (c2001)
  • The body in the Bonfire (c2002)
  • The body in the Lighthouse (c2003)
  • The body in the Attic (2004)
  • The body in the Snowdrift (c2005) Agatha Best Mystery Novel Award
  • The body in the Ivy (c2006)
  • The body in the Gallery (c2008)
  • The body in the Sleigh (c2009)
  • The Body in the Gazebo (2011)
  • The Body in the Boudoir (2012)
  • The Body in the Piazza (2013)

Young Adult Books

  • Christie & Company Down East (c1997)
  • Bon Voyage, Christie & Company (c1999)
  • Club Meds (c2006)

Selected Links

Perry, Katy (1920 - 2014)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Catherine (Katy) Perry was born and raised in Millinocket, ME. She received her teaching degree from Farmington Normal School/State Teachers College and taught for several years.

She has had a radio talk show during the 1960's on local station WRDO, Then served 20 years as PR person for the Maine Department of Human Services. From 1985-1987 she was a Peace Corps volunteer in Belize, she has been a columnist for the Capital Weekly and the Hallowell Record, produced a local television show called "Our Towns," on the local cable network, as well as written several books for adults and for children.

She was Hallowell's Citizen of the Year in 2008 and the Kennebec Valley Chamber of Commerce awarded her their Lifetime Achievement Award in 2009.

Bibliography

  • Drinking From a Tin Cup (1989)
  • Only One Icebox to Fill (c1990)
  • Mad Tuesdays (c1992)
  • My Grandmother Wears Crazy Hats (c1992)
  • Pieces of Earth (c1994)
  • (c1995)
  • Gardens Are for Looking (c1996)
  • Living on the Edge (2003)
  • Years Pass, but Memories Last (Only as Long as We Do) : Remembering Whitefield (2004)
  • Reflections & Recollections: Celebrating Hallowell's 250th, 1762-2012 (2012) with Sam Webber

Reynolds, Cynthia Furlong ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Cynthia Furlong Reynolds is an eleventh generation native Mainer who still summers on Pleasant River Lake in Maine, but lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

She is a graduate of William and Mary College and has written a series of histories as well as several children's books.

Selected Bibliography

  • L is for Lobster : a Maine Alphabet (c2001)
  • S is for Star : a Christmas Alphabet (c2001)
  • Fishing for Numbers : a Maine Number Book (2005)
  • The Far-Flung Adventures of Homer the Hummer (c2005)
  • Rascal makes mischief on Mackinac Island (c2006)
  • Across the Reach (2007)
  • Grammie's Secret Cupboard (2007)
  • Jiffy: A Family Tradition, Mixing Business and Old-Fashioned Values (2008)

Seymour, Tom ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Tom Seymour is an award-winning outdoor columnist, freelance journalist and book author who lives in Waldo, ME. He has been a regular contributor to Maine Fish and Wildlife magazine, and his award-winning outdoor column, "Waldo County Outdoors", has appeared in The Republican Journal for over 20 years.

Selected Bibliography

  • Hiker's Guide to Maine (1995)
  • Hiking Maine (1995)
  • Fishing Maine (1997)
  • Foraging New England : Finding, Identifying, and Preparing Edible Wild Foods and Medicinal Plants from Maine to Connecticut (2002)
  • Tom Seymour's Maine: a Maine Anthology (c2003)
  • Maine Wildlife : Up-close and Personal Encounters of a Maine Naturalist (c2005)
  • Birding Maine : Over 90 Prime Birding Sites at 40 Locations (2008)
  • Hidden World Revealed : Musings of a Maine Naturalist (c2008)
  • Wild Plants of Maine: a Useful Guide (2010)
  • Nuts and Berries of New England: Tips and Recipes for Gatherers from Maine to the Adirondacks to Long Island Sound (2013)

Sharkey, Lee ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet, publisher and editor Lee Sharkey lives in the woods just outside Farmington, ME. She has written several books of poetry, some printed on her own, 100-year-old Pearl platen press. Currently, she is co-editor of the online Beloit Poetry Journal.

Selected Bibliography

  • 8 Line Poems: a Sequence (1975)
  • Pig and Other Portions: Poems (c1976)
  • Farmwife [Poems] (c1977)
  • Daughters Without Mothers : Testimony, Song (1981)
  • Box of Roses (1981)
  • Parataxis (1986)
  • First Moments (1987)
  • To a Vanished World (c1996)
  • A Darker, Sweeter String (c2007)

Selected Links

Shaw, Brenda (1928 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Brenda Shaw grew up on a farm on the outskirts of Augusta, Maine then worked her way through Boston University where she received her doctorate in biological sciences.

She moved to Scotland with her British husband, raised two sons while she worked as a scientist and university lecturer, and published a number of scientific writings. Her poems, short stories and nonfiction have appeared in various periodicals and anthologies on both sides of the Atlantic.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Dark Well: Coming of Age on a Maine Farm (1997)
  • Eliza and Mentora: the Story of a Pioneer Family in Northern Maine (2003)
  • Poems of Maine in the Nineteen Thirties and Forties : by One Who Lived Through Them (2003)

Shetterly, Robert (1946 - )

Genre: Illustrator

Robert Shetterly was born in 1946 in Cincinnati, Ohio. He graduated in 1969 from Harvard College with a degree in English Literature. At Harvard he took a couple of courses in drawing which changed the direction of his creative life --- from the written word to the image. Also, during this time, he was very active in Civil Rights and in the Anti-Vietnam War movement.

After college and moving to Maine in 1970, he taught himself drawing, printmaking, and painting. While trying to become proficient in printmaking & painting, he illustrated widely. For twelve years he did the editorial page drawings for the Maine Times newspaper, illustrated National Audubon's children's newspaper Audubon Adventures, and approximately 30 books.

Now, his paintings & prints are in collections all over the U.S. and Europe. A collection of his drawings & etchings, Speaking Fire at Stones, was published in 1993. He is well know for his series of 70 painted etchings based on William Blake's Proverbs of Hell, and for another series of 50 painted etchings reflecting on the metaphor of the Annunciation. His painting tends toward the narrative and the surreal, and he has not been, until this time, a portrait painter.

Robert Shetterly lives, with his partner Gail Page, also a painter, in Brooksville, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Three Million Mice : a Story of Modern Medical Research by Ada and Frank Graham, drawings by Robert Shetterly (1981)
  • The Dragon Hunters by Frank Graham, Jr., illustrations by Robert Shetterly (1984)
  • The New Year's Owl : Encounters with Animals, People & the Land They Share by Susan Hand Shetterly, etchings by Robert Shetterly, Jr (1986)
  • Speaking Fire at Stones (1992)
  • Americans Who Tell the Truth (c2005)

Selected Resources

Shettleworth, Earle (1948 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Earle Grey Shettleworth, Jr. was born in Portland, Maine on August 17, 1948, the son of Earle G. Shettleworth, Sr. and Esther Knudsen Shettleworth. He was educated in Portland public schools, graduating from Deering High School in 1966. He received a B.A. in Art History from Colby College in 1970, an M.A. in Architectural History from Boston University in 1979, and an L.H.D. from Bowdoin College in 2008.

At the age of thirteen, Shettleworth became interested in historic preservation through the destruction of Portland?s Union Station in 1961. A year later he joined the Sills Committee which founded Greater Portland Landmarks in 1964. In 1971 he was appointed by Governor Curtis to serve on the first board of the Maine Historic Preservation Commission, for which he became architectural historian in 1973 and director in 1976. He is the longest actively serving State Historic Preservation Officer in the nation.

Shettleworth?s elected and appointed positions include president of the Maine Historical Society (1977-79), president of the New England Chapter, Society of Architectural Historians (1995-98), chair of the State House and Capitol Park Commission (1988- ), chair of the Capitol Planning Commission (1998- ), and chair of the Blaine House Commission (2004- ). He served on the Maine Lighthouse Selection Committee in 1997-98 and the State Facilities Master Plan Commission in 1999.

Earle Shettleworth has lectured and written extensively on Maine history and architecture. The Maine Historical Society?s auditorium in Portland was named for him in 1999. In 2004 Governor John E. Baldacci appointed him as State Historian, and he was reappointed to a second term by Governor Baldacci in 2008. (From the State Historian's website)

Selected Bibliography

  • The Flight of the Grand Eagle: Charles G. Bryant, Maine Architect and Adventurer with James H. Mundy (1977)
  • Norlands : the Architecture of the Washburn Estate (1980)
  • The Maine State House : a brief history and guide with Frank A. Beard (1981)
  • The Summer cottages of Islesboro, 1890-1930 (1989)
  • An Eye for the Coast : the Maritime and Monhegan Island Photographs of Eric Hudson (1998) with W.H. Bunting, with the assistance of Paul T. Stubing
  • Mount Desert Island : Somesville, Southwest Harbor, and Northeast Harbor (c2001) with Lydia B. Vandenbergh
  • Victorian Augusta (c2008)
  • Waterville (2013)

Siddons, Anne Rivers (1936 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Horror

Novelist Anne Rivers Siddons lives in South Carolina and summers in Maine

She was born and raised in Georgia and attended Auburn University and was a senior editor for Atlanta magazine. She writes best-selling novels, mostly set in the South.

Selected Bibliography

  • Heartbreak Hotel (1976)
  • The House Next Door (1978)
  • Fox's Earth (1981)
  • Homeplace (1987)
  • Peachtree Road (1988)
  • Kings Oak (1990)
  • Outer Banks (1991)
  • Colony (1992)
  • Hill Towns (1993)
  • Downtown (1994)
  • Fault Lines (1995)
  • Up Island (1997)
  • Low Country (1998)
  • Nora, Nora (2000)
  • Islands (2004)
  • Sweetwater Creek (2005)
  • Off Season (2008)

Silber, Mark (1931? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Mark Silber was born in the Ukraine and emigrated with his family to the United States in 1944 when he was 13 years old.

He and his wife, Terry, both attended Harvard and lived and worked in Boston, weekending in Maine, until 1978 when they moved to Maine permanently and began organic farming at Hedgehog Hill Farm in Sumner.

Hedgehog Hill Farm became a working farm, providing herbs and produce for the local market. Later, the Silbers switched to growing and selling flowers.

The Silbers collaborated -- she writing, he photographing -- on several gardening books.

Selected Bibliography

  • Rural Maine (1972)
  • The Complete Book of Everlastings: Growing, Drying, and Designing with Dried Flowers with Terry Silber (1988)
  • Growing Herbs and Vegetables: From Seed to Harvest with Terry Silber (1999)

Selected Links

Skorpen, Liesel ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's author Liesel Moak Skorpen was born in Germany and emigrated with her family in 1936 to the U.S. to escape Nazi oppression. She lives in Verona Island, just outside Bucksport, ME.

She attended Yale with the intention of becoming a philosophy professor, but married and became the mother of six.

Selected Bibliography

  • If I Had a Lion (1967)
  • Outside My Window (1968)
  • Than Mean Man (1968)
  • We Were Tired of Living in a House (1969)
  • All the Lassies (1970)
  • Elizabeth (1970)
  • Charles (1971)
  • Plenty for Three (1971)
  • Phipps (1972)
  • Old Arthur (1972)
  • Kisses and Fishes (1974)
  • Mandy's Grandmother (1975)
  • Michael (1975)
  • Bird (1976)
  • His Mother's Dog (1978)
  • Grace (1984)

Smith, Edmund (1900 - 1967)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Edmund Ware Smith was born in Plantsville, CT, raised in Newton, MA and lived in Maine on Mattagamon Lake in Baxter State Park and in South Bristol.

He was editorial director for the Ford Times for over 17 years and contributed to other magazines such as Field and Stream. He was best known for his "One-Eyed Poacher" stories. Smith and artist Maurice "Jake" Day were good friends and members of "Jake's Rangers" (named for Day), a group of outdoorsmen, which also included Justice William O. Douglas. Day illustrated some of Smith's books.

Selected Bibliography

  • The One-Eyed Poacher and the Maine Woods (1955)
  • New England's Last Wilderness : the Valley of the Wassataquoick (1956)
  • A Treasury of the Maine Woods (1958)
  • For Maine Only (1959)
  • Along Thoreau's Canoe Trail (1959)

Stammen, Jo Ellen ( - )

Genre: Illustrator

Jo Ellen McAllister Stammen is an artist, designer and award-winning illustrator of over 18 children's books. She lives in Camden, ME.

Her hyper-realistic work is done in pastels and she specializes in animals.

Selected Bibliography

  • Lobster for Lunch by Bob Hartman (1992)
  • Wild Fox by Cherie Mason (1994) Lupine Award Winner
  • Bears Out There by Joanne Ryder (1995)
  • A Snow Story by Melvin J. Leavitt (1995)
  • If You Were Born a Kitten by Marion Dane Bauer (1997)
  • Teddy Bear Tears by Jim Aylesworth (1997)
  • Baby Wolf by Mary Batten (1998)
  • The Angel Tree by Helena Clare Pittman (1998)
  • Sleep, Little One, Sleep by Marion Dane Bauer (1999)
  • Jubela by Christina Kessler (2001)
  • Crocodile Listens by April Pulley Sayre (2001)
  • Hero Cat by Eileen Spinelli (2006)

Steingesser, Martin (1937? - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet, educator and erstwhile stilt-dancer, Martin Steingesser lives in Portland, ME. He was born and raised in New York, attended New York University and Hofstra, lived and worked in Manhattan and Greenwich Village for a while, then moved to Maine in 1981.

He was named Portland's first poet laureate in 2007. He has taught poetry in the classroom as well as for the Maine Arts Commission in workshops.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Wildman : a Short Fable (1985)
  • Moonwings = Alas De Luna (1987)
  • Brothers of Morning : Poems (2002)

Stelmok, Jerry ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Master canoe builder Jerry Stelmok is a native Mainer who was raised on a dairy farm in Auburn and lives in Atkinson, ME. He has been building E. M. White style wood and canvas canoes for over 25 years and is the owner of Island Falls Canoe Company. He has written several books about building and enjoying canoes and about growing up in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Building the Maine Guide Canoe (1980)
  • The Wood & Canvas Canoe : a Complete Guide to its' History, Construction, Restoration, and Maintenance with Rollin Thurlow (c1987)
  • The Art of the Canoe with Joe Seliga (2002)
  • Not Your Average Bear & Other Maine Stories (2007)
  • Growing up on Maple Hill Farm: a New England Farm Life (2007)

Sutherland, Amy (1959? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Amy Sutherland is an award-winning author, an adjunct professor in the Department of Journalism at Boston University, and former features writer for the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram. She was born and raised in Cincinnati, OH and lives in Portland, ME and Boston, MA.

She received her B.A. in art history from the University of Cincinnati (1982) and her M.S.J. from the Medill School of Journalism, Northwestern University (1987).

Bibliography

  • Cookoff: Recipe Fever in America (2003)
  • Kicked, Bitten and Scratched: Life and Lessons at the Premier School for Exotic Animal Trainers (2006)
  • What Shamu Taught Me About Life, Love and Marriage: Lessons for People From Animals and Their Trainers (2008)

Swenson, Allan ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Allan Swenson is the author of more than thirty gardening books and has been a syndicated columnist for over twenty-five years. He has been a featured columnist for Gardener's Notebook and TV's "Dr. Plant", and also has appeared regularly on the Christian Broadcasting Network's 700 Club with his gardening feature, "Let's Grow Together." He lives in Kennebunk, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Wood Heat (c1979)
  • The World Within the Tidal Pool (1979)
  • Your Biblical Garden: Plants of the Bible and How to Grow Them (1981)
  • The Gardener's Book of Berries (1994)
  • Fruit Trees for the Home Gardener (c1994)
  • Flowers of the Bible: and How to Grow Them (2002)
  • Herbs of the Bible and How to Grow Them (c2003)
  • The Everything Landscaping Book: From Planning to Planting, Mulching to Maintenance--Simple Steps to Beautify Your Property (c2003)
  • The Everything Gardening Book: Grow Beautiful Flowers, Delicious Vegetables, and Healthy Herbs Right in Your Own Backyard (c2003)
  • Foods Jesus Ate and How to Grow Them
  • Great Growing at Home: the Essential Guide to Gardening Basics (2008)

Tavares, Matt (1975 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Award-winning author/illustrator Matt Tavares was born in Boston and grew up in Winchester, MA. He graduated from Bates College where he wrote and illustrated his first book for his senior thesis. He lives in Ogunquit, ME.

Selected Bibliography

Author/Illustrator

  • Oliver's Game (2004)
  • Mudball (2005)
  • Henry Aaron's Dream (2010)
  • There Goes Ted Williams: The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived (2012)
  • Becoming Babe Ruth (2013)
  • Growing Up Pedro (2015)
  • Crossing Niagara: The Death-Defying Tightrope Adventures Of The Great Blondin [2016]
  • Red and Lulu (2017)
  • Dasher(/cite> (2019)

Illustrator

  • Jack and the Beanstalk by E. Nesbit
  • 'Twas the Night Before Christmas; or, Account of a Visit from St. Nicholas [by Clement Clarke Moore] (2006)
  • Iron Hans : a Grimm's Fairy Tale retold by Stephen Mitchell (2007)
  • Lady Liberty : a Biography by Doreen Rappaport (2008)
  • The Gingerbread Pirates by Kristin Kladstrup (2009)
  • Over The River And Through The Wood: The New England Boy's Song About Thanksgiving Day by L. Maria Child (2011)
  • Helen's Big World: The Life Of Helen Keller Written By Doreen Rappaport (c2012)
  • Jubilee!: One Man's Big, Bold, And Very, Very Loud Celebration Of Peace by Alicia Potter (2014)
  • Lighter Than Air: Sophie Blanchard, The First Woman Pilot by Matthew Clark Smith [2017]
  • A Ben Of All Trades: The Most Inventive Boyhood Of Benjamin Franklin by Michael J. Rosen (2020)

Thaxter, Celia (1835 - 1894)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Celia Laighton Thaxter was born in Portsmouth NH but, at the age of four, moved to White Island, Isles of Shoals where her father accepted the job of lighthouse keeper.

She married at sixteen and moved to the mainland but, after ten years, returned to Appledore Island, Isles of Shoals -- the place where she felt most comfortable. She became the hostess at her father's hotel, Appledore House, welcoming many of the best and brightest New England had to offer in literary and artistic circles -- writers like Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, John Whittier, Sarah Orne Jewett, and artists William Morris Hunt and Childe Hassam (who used Celia as a model, more than once).

She began writing poetry and essays and became one of nineteenth century-America's most-beloved writers.

She died on Appledore Island and was buried not far from the cottage where she lived.

Selected Bibliography

  • Among the Isles of Shoals (1873)
  • Drift-Weed (1879)
  • Poems for Children (1884)
  • An Island Garden with pictures and illuminations by Childe Hassam (1894)

Selected Resources

Thorne, John (1943? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

John Thorne was born in Quincy, MA and spent childhood summers on Long Island in Casco Bay, then lived in Maine for several years in Castine and Steuben. He lives in Northampton, MA.

A graduate of Amherst College, Thorne is a food writer. He began publishing pamphlets on food in 1976, hand copied and bound, which later turned into a newsletter called Simple Cooking that Thorne continued to publish for over 25 years. Those newsletters eventually became several books, some co-written with his wife, Matt Lewis Thorne.

Selected Bibliography

  • Simple Cooking (1987)
  • Outlaw Cook (with Matt Lewis Thorne)(1992)
  • Serious Pig : An American Cook in Search of His Roots (with Matt Lewis Thorne) (1996)
  • Home Body (1997) (concerns domestic, not culinary topics)
  • Pot on the Fire : Further Confessions of a Renegade Cook (with Matt Lewis Thorne) (2000)
  • Mouth Wide Open (with Matt Lewis Thorne) (2007)

Selected Links

Van Deventer, George (1935 - 2023)

Genre: Poetry

Poet George V. Van Deventer was born in Newark, New Jersey. He has lived in Maine for many years, some as a dairy farmer in Washington, ME. He retired to Bristol, ME.

From 1990 - 1997 he was the executive director of the Live Poets Society of Maine and editor of its newsletter Off the Coast. He also worked extensively in the public school system developing workshops in poetry for elementary school children.

Selected Bibliography

  • Singing: [Poems] (1994)
  • Festival of Children and Poetry : Maine's Midcoast Poetry Super Bowl editor (1998)
  • Angels and Clay Feet: [Poems] (1998)

Vaughan, Susan ( - )

Genre: Romance Novel

Romantic suspense novelist Susan Vaughan is a native of West Virginia and lives in St. George, ME.

After achieving her bachelor's degree in french literature and her master's degree, she taught for many years before turning to writing romantic suspense novels.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dangerous Attraction (2001)
  • Guarding Laura (2004)
  • Code Name: Fiancee (2005)
  • Breaking all the Rules (2006)
  • Deadly Memories (2006)
  • Primal Obsession (2008)

von Teufel, Blanche (1847 - 1898)

Genre: General Fiction

Blanche Willis Howard von Teufel was born and raised in Bangor, graduated from Bangor High School, but lived most of her adult life in Germany.

She moved to Germany in 1877 to write articles for the Boston Evening Transcript, ended up staying there and opening a finishing school for young ladies.

Most of her novels were written in Germany under the name Blanche Willis Howard (she didn't marry until 1890). She was one of the few popular novelists writing from abroad and is credited with helping to popularize American travel to Europe.

She died in Munich in 1898.

Selected Bibliography

  • One Summer (1875)
  • One Year Abroad (1877)
  • Aunt Serena (1881)
  • Guenn: a Wave on the Breton Coast (1884)
  • Aulnay Tower (1885)
  • The Open Door (1889)
  • No Heroes (1893)
  • Seven on the Highway (1897)
  • The Garden of Eden (1900)
  • Dioysius the Weaver's Heart's Dearest (1900)

Wagner, David (1950? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

David Wagner was born and raised in New York. He received both his bachelor's degree in history and his master's degree in social work from Columbia University, his master's in labor studies from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst and his PhD in sociology from the City University of New York.

He has worked as a social worker and organizer for low income groups and the homeless and has written several books in the fields of poverty and inequality, social and political change and the history of social welfare.

He is a professor at the University of Southern Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Checkerboard Square (1993)winner, C. Wright Mills award
  • The New Temperance: The American Obsession with Sin and Vice (1998) winner, Northeast Popular Culture Award
  • What's Love Got to Do With It? A Critical Look At American Charity (2000)
  • The Poorhouse: America's Forgotten Institution (2005)
  • Ordinary People: In and Out of Poverty in the Gilded Age (2008)
  • Unlikely Fame: Poor People Who Made History with Jenna Nunziato (2014)

Wakefield, Darcy (1969 - 2005)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Darcy Wakefield was born and raised in North Livermore, ME. and resided in Cape Elizabeth at the time of her death.

She graduated from high school at the Waynflete School in Portland, received her MFA in writing from Emerson College and an MA in American Studies from SUNY/Buffalo and a BA from Smith College.

She was an English professor at Southern Maine Community College.

She was diagnosed in 2003 with ALS (Lou Gehrig's Disease) and died in 2005.

Bibliography

  • I Remember Running : the Year I Got Everything I Ever Wanted--and ALS (2005)
  • "No Flies on Bill" : the Story of an Uncontrollable Old Woman, my Grandmother, Ethel "Billie" Gammon (c2006)

Wegman, William (1943 - )

Genre:

William Wegman was born in 1943 in Holyoke, Massachusetts. He received a B.F.A. in painting from the Massachusetts College of Art, Boston in 1965 and an M.F.A. in painting from the University of Illinois, Champagne-Urbana in 1967. From 1968 to 1970 he taught at the University of Wisconsin. In the fall of 1970 he moved to Southern California where he taught for one year at California State College, Long Beach.

He is best known for his photos of his Weimaraner dogs -- Man Ray, Fay Ray and family -- posed and dressed in different, usually comical, vignettes.

He lives in New York and Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • ABC (1994)
  • William Wegman's Mother Goose (1996)
  • William Wegman's Farm Days: or How Chip Learnt an Important Lesson on the Farm, or a Day in the Country, or Hip Chip's Trip, or Farmer Boy (1997)
  • William Wegman Puppies (1997)
  • My Town (1998)
  • What Do You Do? (1999)
  • William Wegman's Pups (1999)
  • Man's Best Friend: Photographs and Drawings (1999)
  • Fay (1999)
  • Surprise Party (2000)
  • William Wegman's Wegmanology (2001)
  • William Wegman Poloroids (2000)
  • How do you get to MOMAQNS? (2002)
  • Chip Wants a Dog (2003)
  • Dogs on Rocks (2008)

Cannell, Dorothy (1943 - )

Genre: Mystery, Short Stories

Mystery writer Dorothy Cannell was born on June 23, 1943 in Nottingham, England, moved to the U.S. in 1963, and lived in Peoria, Illinois. She and her husband moved to Belfast, Maine in 2005 to be near the ocean.

Selected Bibliography

Ellie Haskell series

  • The Thin Woman (1984)
  • The Widow's Club (1988), nominated for an Agatha Award for best novel
  • Mum's the Word (1990)
  • Femmes Fatal (1992)
  • How to Murder Your Mother-In-Law (1994)
  • How to Murder the Man of Your Dreams (1995)
  • The Spring Cleaning Murders (1998)
  • The Trouble with Harriet (1999)
  • Bridesmaids Revisited (2000)
  • The Importance of Being Ernestine (2002)
  • Withering Heights (2007)

Other Novels

  • Down the Garden Path: A Pastoral Mystery (1985), featuring Tessa Fields
  • God Save the Queen (1997)
  • Naked Came The Farmer (1998) (with Nancy Atherton and many others)
  • The Sunken Sailor (2004) (with Simon Brett, Deborah Crombie, and many others)
  • The Family Jewels and Other Stories (2001)
  • Sea Glass Summer (2012)

Florence Norris Series

  • Murder at Mullings (2014)
  • Death at Dovecote Hatch (2015)

Weinberger, (Rebecca) Jane (1918 - 2009)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Rebecca Jane Dalton Weinberger was a native Mainer, born in Milford, ME. She attended the University of Maine and graduated from the Somerville Hospital School of Nursing in Somerville, MA. She became an Army nurse and met her husband, future Defense Secretary (under President Ronald Reagan) Caspar Weinberger, on a troop ship on the way the Australia during WWII.

She was an author and publisher -- her publishing house was called Windswept Press, named for the Weinberger's home on Mount Desert Island, ME -- publishing first her own books, then expanding to publish the works of other authors.

She died in 2009 in Bar Harbor, ME.

Selected Bibliography

Children's Books

  • That's What Counts! (1983)
  • VIM, a Very Important Mouse (1984)
  • Fanny and Sarah (1984)
  • Wee Peter Puffin (1984)
  • Lemon Drop (1985)
  • Tabitha Jones (1985)
  • Kiltie, the Laird of Kiltarnin (1985)

Books for Adults

  • As Ever: a Selection of Letters from the Voluminous Correspondence of Jane Weinberger, 1970-1990 (1991)
  • Canned Plums and Other Vicissitudes of Life: Being the Reminiscences of Several Old Women who Really had Ought to Know Better than to Commit Anything to Print (1999)
  • Experience the Journey: Oh, Those Golden Years (2003)

Selected Links

Willis, Nathaniel (1806 - 1867)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Editor, journalist and essayist Nathaniel Parker Willis was born in Portland, ME in 1806. He grew up in Portland and Boston, lived for many years in Europe, then returned to the United States and settled in New York.

A member of a family with a history in journalism (his father was a newspaperman in Portland, and his grandfather in Boston), he founded the New York Mirror in 1829. It failed in 1831, but he recreated it in 1844 as the Evening Mirror. In 1846, he left the and started the weekly National Press which quickly became the Home Journal which he continued to edit until his death in 1867. Its name was again changed in 1901 to Town and County and is still in publication.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sketches (as N.P. Willis) (1827)
  • Poem Delivered Before the Society of United Brothers at Brown University, on the Day Preceding Commencement, September 6, 1831: and Other Poems (1831)
  • Melanie and Other Poems (1831)
  • Pencillings by the Way: Written During Some Years of Residence and Travel in France, Italy, Greece, Asia Minor, Turkey and England (1844)
  • Out-Doors at Idlewild, or, The Shaping of a Home on the Banks of the Hudson (1855)
  • The Poems, Sacred, Passionate and Humorous of Nathaniel Parker Willis (1870)

Willis, Clint (1957? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Editor and author Clint Willis lives in Cape Elizabeth, ME. Editor of over forty books, most anthologies on topics like adventure, politics and war, his writing has also been published in many magazines such as Men's Journal, Money and The New York Times.

Willis has been climbing since the age of ten and has written several books on the subject.

Selected Bibliography

Author

  • The Boys Of Everest : Chris Bonington And The Tragedy Of Climbing's Greatest Generation (c2006)

Editor

  • Epic: Stories Of Survival From The World's Highest Peaks (c1997)
  • Wild: Stories Of Survival From The World's Most Dangerous Places (c1999)
  • High : Stories Of Survival From Everest And K2 (c1999)
  • Adrenaline 2000: The Year's Best Stories Of Adventure And Survival (2000)
  • The I Hate The 21st Century Reader: The Awful, The Annoying, And The Absurd--From Ethnic Cleansing (2005)

Woods, Stuart (1938 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Prolific, best-selling author Stuart Woods was born in Manchester, GA and lives on Mount Desert Island, ME, Key West, FL and New York City.

He graduated from the University of GA with a BA in Sociology. He has worked in advertising in both the U.S., Ireland and London, spent time in the Air Force stationed in Germany, eventually he returned to Georgia where he began his writing career writing non-fiction. His first novel Chiefs was published in 1981, won the Mystery Writers of America's Edgar Award and became a major television mini-series. He has since written over forty novels, with 28 straight NYT bestsellers.

Selected Bibliography

  • Chiefs (1981) Edgar Award winner
  • Run Before the Wind (c1983)
  • Deep Lie: a Novel (c1986)
  • Under the Lake (c1987)
  • White Cargo: a Novel (c1988)
  • Grass Roots: a Novel (c1989)
  • Palindrome (c1991)
  • New York Dead (c1991)
  • Santa Fe Rules: a Novel (c1992)
  • L.A. Times: a Novel (1993)
  • Dead Eyes: a Novel (c1994)
  • Imperfect Strangers (1995)
  • Choke: a Novel (c1995)
  • Dirt: a novel (1996)
  • Dead in the Water: a Novel (c1997)
  • Orchid Beach a Novel (1998)
  • Worst Fears Realized: a Novel (c1999)
  • L.A. Dead (c2000)
  • Cold Paradise (c2001)
  • Orchid Blues (2001)
  • Blood Orchid (2002)
  • Dirty Work (c2003)
  • Capital Crimes (c2003)
  • Reckless Abandon (c2004)
  • The Prince of Beverly Hills (c2004)
  • Two-dollar Bill (c2005)
  • Iron Orchid (2005)
  • Strategic Moves (2011)
  • D. C. Dead (2012)
  • Unnatural Acts: A Stone Barrington Novel (2012)
  • Severe Clear: A Stone Barrington Novel (2012)
  • Collateral Damage: A Stone Barrington Novel (2012)
  • Treason (2020)
  • Hit List (2020)
  • Bombshell (2020) with Parnell Hall
  • Choppy Water (2020)

Selected Non-Fiction Titles

  • Blue Water, Green Skipper: A Memoir of Sailing Alone Across the Atlantic (2012)

Selected Resources

Yglesias, Jose (1919 - 1995)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Novelist, journalist and playwright Jose Yglesias was born in Ybor City section of Tampa, FL and lived in New York City and North Brooklin, ME. He served in the U.S. Navy and studied at Black Mountain College in North Carolina.

Best known for his writing about Latin Americans whose lives were affected by revolutions, he was of Cuban and Spanish descent. He was a film critic for The Daily Worker, wrote articles for The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, among other periodicals, as well as non-fiction, novels and plays.

Bibliography

  • A Wake in Ybor City (1973)
  • The Goodbye Land (1967)
  • In the Fist of the Revolution (1968)
  • An Orderly Life (1968)
  • Down There (1970)
  • The Truth About Them (1971)
  • Double Double (1974)
  • The Franco Years (1975)
  • The Kill Price (1976)
  • Home Again (c1987)
  • Tristan and the Hispanics (1989)
  • Widower?s Walk (1996)
  • The Guns In The Closet (1996)
  • The Old Gents (1996)
  • Break In (1996)

Selected Links

Murray, Eva (1964 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Author and columnist Eva Murray lives on Matinicus Island. Her articles have been published in Maine Boats, Homes & Harbors; Working Waterfront; Down East online and the (Rockland) Free Press as well as on her own website (see link below).

She published her first book in 2010.

Bibliography

  • Well Out to Sea: Year-Round on Matinicus Island (2010)
  • Island Schoolhouse: One Room for All (2012)

Selected Links

Flahive, Jean (1947 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Jean Mary Flahive's ancestors settled in Phippsburg, ME. She lives in Falmouth with her husband.

Most of her career has been in higher education, serving as a dean of students at a community college in Maine, and as an adjunct instructor at the college level. She has also served as a grant writer for the Passamaquoddy Tribe, rural communities, and non-profit organizations throughout Maine.

Bibliography

  • Billy Boy: the Sunday Soldier of the 17th Maine (2007)
  • Remember Me, Mikwid Hamin: Tomah Joseph's Gift to Franklin Roosevelt (2009) with David Soctomah

Woisard, Rebekah (1956 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Author and illustrator Rebekah Raye Woisard has lived in Deer Isle and Blue Hill ME since 1976.

She graduated from the University of Maine (Orono) with a B.A. in art education (1982).

Bibliography

Author/Illustrator (as Rebekah Raye)

  • Very Best Bed (2006)
  • Bear-ly There (2009)

Illustrator

  • Thanks to the Animals by Allen Sockabasin (c2005)

Soctomah, Donald (1955 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Young Adult

Author, oral historian and legislator Donald Soctomah was born and raised in Maine. He lives at Indian Township near Peter Dana Point.

A native Passamaquoddy, Soctomah is Tribal Historic Preservation Officer for the Passamaquoddy tribe and has represented the Tribe in the Legislature since 2006. An oral historian, he is actively recording the oral history of his people.

Bibliography

  • Passamaquoddy At The Turn Of The Century 1890-1920: Tribal Life And Times In Maine And New Brunswick (2002)
  • Hard Times At Passamaquoddy, 1921-1950: Tribal Life And Times In Maine And New Brunswick (2003)
  • Let Me Live As My Ancestors Had 1850-1890: Tribal Life And Times In Maine And New Brunswick (2005)
  • Meddybemps Cultural Study: N'tolonapemk: A Visit To Our Ancestors' Place (2005)
  • Remember Me, Mikwid Hamin: Tomah Joseph's Gift To Franklin Roosevelt with Jean Flahive (2009)

Kelsey, Kerck (1933 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Kerck Kelsey is an descendant of Cadwallader C. Washburn, one of the famous Norlands Washburns, and lives in South Freeport, ME.

After a career in textbook publishing and banking, Kelsey received his Master's Degree in History from Harvard, just prior to his seventieth birthday.

Bibliography

  • Israel Washburn Jr.: Maine's Little-Known Giant Of The Civil War (2004)
  • Remarkable Americans: The Washburn Family (2008)

Selected Links

Bunting, William (1945 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Historian, author and master story-teller William H. Bunting lives in Whitefield, ME.

Bibliography

  • Portrait Of A Port: Boston, 1852-1914 (1971)
  • Steamers, Schooners, Cutters, And Sloops; The Marine Photographs Of N. L. Stebbins Taken From 1884 to 1907 (1974)
  • Portrait Of A Port : Boston, 1852-1914 (1994)
  • A Day's Work: A Sampler Of Historic Maine Photographs, 1860-1920 (1997)
  • An Eye for the Coast : the Maritime and Monhegan Island Photographs of Eric Hudson with Earle G. Shettleworth, Jr. and Paul T. Stubing (1998)
  • Sea Struck (2004)
  • The Camera's Coast: Historic Images Of Ship And Shore In New England (2006)
  • Live Yankees : The Sewalls And Their Ships (2009)

Bennett, Dean (1935 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator, Non-Fiction

As with nearly nine generations of his family, Dean B. Bennett was born and raised in Maine. He lives in Mount Vernon, ME.

Bennett is professor emeritus at the University of Maine at Farmington. Born and raised in Maine, he received a Ph.D. in Resource Planning and Conservation from the School of Natural Resources at the University of Michigan with a special emphasis in environmental education, a master's degree in science education from the University of Southern Maine, and an Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from the University of Maine at Farmington. He is a journeyman cabinetmaker, completing a four-year apprenticeship at the F. O. Bailey Company in Portland, Maine, through the Maine State Apprenticeship Council, and after receiving a bachelor's degree in Industrial Arts Education at Gorham State Teachers College, he taught industrial arts in the Yarmouth, Maine, school system for several years. Much of his professional life, however, has been devoted to teaching, writing, and illustrating books in the fields of science and environmental education, natural history, and human relationships with nature. He served as the first environmental education school curriculum specialist in the Maine State Department of Education. He was among one-hundred educators selected by UNESCO to participate in the first world environmental education conference in Belgrade, Yugoslavia. He received the Percival Baxter Award for Leadership in Wilderness Preservation from the Maine Chapter of the Sierra Club, the Environmental Activist Award for protection of the Allagash Wilderness Waterway from the Natural Resources Council of Maine, and the Teacher of the Year Award from Maine Audubon Society. (Tilbury House Publishers http://www.tilburyhouse.com/maine-and-new-england/nature-and-renewal.htm )

Selected Bibliography

Books for Adults

  • Maine's Natural Heritage: Rare Species And Unique Natural Features (c1988)
  • Allagash : Maine's Wild And Scenic River (1994)
  • The Forgotten Nature Of New England: A Search For Traces Of The Original Wilderness (c1996)
  • The Wilderness From Chamberlain Farm: A Story Of Hope For The American Wild (c2001)
  • Everybody Needs A Hideaway (c2004)
  • Nature And Renewal : Wild River Valley And Beyond (2009)

Books for Juveniles

  • Finding A Friend In The Forest : A True Story (2005)
  • The Late Loon (2006)

Cole, Stephen (1955 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Stephen A. Cole directs the natural resources and sustainable communities programs at Coastal Enterprises, Inc., a community-development corporation. He lives in Damariscotta, Maine, with his family.

Selected Bibliography

  • I Was Content and Not Content: The Story of Linda Lord and the Closing of Penobscot Poultry with Cedric N. Chatterley and Alicia J. Rouverol (c2000)
  • The Rangeley and Its Region: The Famous Boat and Lakes of Western Maine (2007)
  • The Cranberry: Hard Work and Holiday Sauce with Lindy Gifford (2009)

Schmitt, Catherine (1976 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Science writer Catherine Schmitt was born and raised in New Jersey. She received her B.S. in environmental science from UMass-Amherst in 1998. She worked in the Connecticut River Valley, then for the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, and for the Senator George J. Mitchell Center for Environmental and Watershed Research sampling water quality of lakes and streams. She received her M.S. in ecology and environmental science in 2003.

She is now communications coordinator for Maine Sea Grant and writes feature stories for local and regional publications such as Working Waterfront and Maine Boats, Homes and Harbors.

Bibliography

  • A Coastal Companion: A Year In The Gulf Of Maine, From Cape Cod To Canada (2008)
  • The state of Maine's beaches [electronic resource] (2009)

Selected Links

Aaron, Hugh ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Hugh Aaron was born and raised in Worcester, MA and lives in Cushing, ME. He was a Seabee in the South Pacific during World War II. After the war he graduated from the University of Chicago with a liberal arts degree in Humanities, then worked as the CEO of his own plastics materials business. He has written several books and published eighteen of his articles in The Wall Street Journal. Currently, he is concentrating on writing plays.

Selected Bibliography

  • Business Not As Usual: How To Win Managing A Company Through Hard And Easy Times (c1993)
  • When Wars Were Won (c1995)
  • It's All Chaos: Tales Of The Young, Old, And The Middle Aged (c1996)
  • Letters From The Good War : A Young Man's Discovery Of The World (c1997)

Jalali, Reza (1954 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Reza Jalali, a native Kurd from Iran, moved to Maine in 1985. He writes both fiction and nonfiction. His work has appeared in the overseas publications Deccan Herald (Bangalore, India), Paivand (Montreal, Canada), and Exiled Ink! (London, England),and domestically in Maine Sunday Telegram, Portland Press Herald, Casco Bay Weekly, Dissident, Say, Free Press, and Maine Progressive.

Bibliography

  • Child Labor: A Global View (2004) contributing author
  • The World of Child Labor: An Historical and Regional Survey (2009) contributing author
  • New Mainers (2009) co-authored and provided foreward
  • God Speaks in Many Accents (scheduled for publication in 2011)
  • Homesick Mosque and other stories (2013)
  • The Poets and the Assassin (2016)

Childrens Books

  • Moon Watchers (2010)

Selected Links

Mayo, Matthew (1968 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Short Stories

Matthew P. Mayo was raised in Rhode Island and Vermont. He received his B.A. from Lyndon State College in VT and his M.F.A. from Goddard College, also in VT. He is a freelance magazine editor and has worked on Down East, Big Sky Journal, Miami Living, Western Art and Architecture, and Fly Rod & Reel. He also writes feature articles and book reviews for a variety of publications. His short stories have also appeared in Timeshares and Steampunk'd.

Selected Bibliography

Short Stories

  • "Half a Pig" (included in A Fistful of Legends) (2010) Spur Award Finalist

Novels

  • Winters' War (2007)
  • Wrong Town (2008)
  • Hot Lead, Cold Heart (2008)

Non-Fiction

  • Cowboys, Mountain Men & Grizzly Bears: Fifty of the Grittiest Moments in the History of the Wild West (2009)
  • Bootleggers, Lobstermen & Lumberjacks: Fifty of the Grittiest Moments in the History of Hardscrabble New England (2010)

Wilcox, Phoebe ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Poet and author Phoebe Wilcox is a summer resident of Southwest Harbor; she lives the rest of the year in Perkasie, Pennsylvania.

Her stories and poems have been published in many literary magazines, including The Chaffey Review, Bartleby-Snopes, River Poets Journal, and ginosko. Her short stories have twice been nominated for the Pushcart Prize.

Bibliography

  • Recidivism (2010)
  • Angels Carry the Sun (2010)

Booraem, Ellen ( - )

Genre: Young Adult

Ellen Booraem was born and raised on the coast of Massachusetts and lives in Brooklin, ME. She has worked as a writer and editor for colleges, newspapers and corporate newsletters in Massachusetts and Rhode Island and for the Ellsworth American, a small, weekly newspaper in Maine. She started working full time as a novelist in 2003.

Bibliography

  • The Unnameables (2008)

Selected Links

Fagan, Deva ( - )

Genre: Young Adult

Deva Fagan was born in New York City and lives in Hallowell, ME. She received her B.A. from Bowdoin College and her M.A. from State University of New York at Stony Brook, both in mathematics. She works as a software engineer as well as writing books for young adults.

Bibliography

  • Fortune's Folly (2009)
  • The Magical Misadventures of Prunella Bogthistle (2010)
  • Circus Galactus (2011)
  • Rival Magic (2020)

Selected Links

Blakemore, Megan ( - )

Genre: Young Adult

Megan Frazer studied literature and creative writing at Columbia University. She is a young adult novelist and high school librarian in Maine.

Bibliography

  • Secrets of Truth & Beauty (2009)
  • The Water Castle (2013) illus. by Jim Kay

Selected Links

MacCready, Robin (1956? - )

Genre: Young Adult

Robin Merrow MacCready grew up in Kennebunk, ME. She teaches 4th - 6th grade language arts and writes books for teens. She has a Master's degree in Education from Wheelock College.

Bibliography

  • Buried (2006) Edgar Award Best YA 2006

Selected Links

McClymer, Kelly (1957? - )

Genre: Romance Novel, Young Adult

Novelist Kelly McClymer lives in Orono, ME. She received her B.A. in English from the University of Delaware in 1983. She writes historical romance novels and books for young adults.

Selected Bibliography

Historical Romances

  • Fairy Tale Bride (2000)
  • Infamous Bride (2001)
  • Unintended Bride (2001)
  • Star-Crossed Bride (2001)
  • Impetuous Bride (2002)
  • Next Best Bride (2003)

Young Adult Books

  • Getting to Third Date (2006)
  • Salem Witch Tryouts (2006)
  • Competition's a Witch (2007)
  • Must Love Black (2008)

Selected Links

Caverly, Tim (1948 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

Tim Caverly is a native Mainer who grew up in Skowhegan and lives in Millinocket, ME. He received his B.S. from the University of Maine, Machias. He has worked as a park ranger at Sebago Lake State Park, manager of Aroostook and Cobscook Bay State Parks as well as a regional supervisor of the Allagash Region, which included the Allagash Wilderness Waterway and the Penobscot River Corridor. Tim was supervisor of the Allagash Wilderness Waterway for eighteen years and retired from the Department of Conservation in 1999. He works for the Millinocket school system.

Bibliography

  • Allagash Tails : A Collection Of Short Stories From Maine's Allagash Wilderness Waterway (2009)
  • An Allagash Haunting: the Story of Emile Camile (2009)
  • Wilderness Wildlife: Animal Antics from our Nation's Premier Wild and Scenic River "The Allagash!" (2010)
  • A Wilderness Ranger's Journal : Rendezvous At Devil's Elbow : Tales From A National Wild And Scenic River (2011)
  • Headin' North (2013)
  • The Ranger's Wife with Franklin Manzo Jr. (2019)

Abbott, John (1805 - 1877)

Genre: Non-Fiction

John S. C. Abbott, brother of Jacob Abbott, was born in Brunswick, ME. He graduated from Bowdoin College in 1825 and attended Andover Theological Seminary. He preached in Massachusetts from 1830 until 1844 when he retired and turned his attention to literature. He was primarily an author of popular histories and books on Christian ethics.

He died in Connecticut in 1877.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Mother At Home; Or, The Principles Of Maternal Duty Familiarly Illustrated (1833)
  • History of Madame Roland (1850)
  • History of Josephine 1851)
  • History of Napoleon Bonaparte (1855)
  • The French Revolution Of 1789: As Viewed In The Light Of Republican Institutions (1859)
  • History of Maria Antoinette (1860)
  • The history of the Civil War in America... (1863-1866)
  • Daniel Boone: Pioneer of Kentucky (1872)
  • David Crockett: His Life and Adventures (1874)

Selected Links

Albee, Fred (1876 - 1945)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Pioneering surgeon Fred Houdlette Albee was born in Alna, ME. He attended Lincoln Academy and graduated from Bowdoin College. He received his medical degree from Harvard. He developed the first bone grafting technique and was a pioneer in grafting surgery. During World War I, he worked in allied hospitals and his technique saved many limbs which, without its use, would have been amputated. In 1917, in order to address the many orthopedic injuries caused by the war, he opened the first orthopedic hospital in New Jersey.

Bibliography

  • Bone Graft Surgery (1915)
  • Orthopedic and Reconstructional Surgery (1919)
  • Orthopedic and reconstruction surgery, industrial and civilian (1919)
  • Injuries and Diseases of the Hip (1937)
  • Bone Graft Surgery in Disease, Injury, and Deformity (1940)
  • A Surgeon's Fight to Rebuild Men: An Autobiography (1943)

Selected Resources

Thayer, Ellen ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Artist, photographer and author Ellen Thayer lives with her family on the coast of Maine. She received her B.S. in Meteorology from St. Louis University in Missouri and took graduate courses in communication at Emerson College in Boston. She worked for 23 years as a professional television meteorologist in Portland, Minneapolis and Boston. Her oil paintings are displayed in galleries along the coast of Maine.

Bibliography

  • My Christmas Surprise (2010)

Ames, Louise (1908? - 1996)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Psychologist and author Louise Bates Ames was born in Portland, ME. She received both her bachelor's and her master's degrees from the University of Maine and her PhD from Yale in 1937. She is known for working with Frances Ilg and Arnold Gesell in developing the thesis that ages have patterned, predictable behavior -- they coined the term the "terrible twos." She was a prolific writer and her work included a newspaper column she wrote with Dr. Ilg, several books she co-authored, and she also developed several television series on child development. She died of cancer in 1996 at the age of 88.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Child From Five To Ten (1946) with Drs. Ilg and Gesell
  • Parents Ask (1962) with Dr. Ilg
  • Child Behavior (1966) with Dr. Ilg
  • Is Your Child in the Wrong Grade? (1967)
  • Child Care and Development (1970)
  • Your Two Year Old: Terrible or Tender? (1976)
  • Arnold Gesell: Themes of His Work (1989)
  • Raising Good Kids : A Developmental Approach To Discipline (1992)

Selected Resources

Archer, Gleason (1880 - 1966)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Attorney, visionary educator, television broadcaster and writer and author Gleason Archer, Sr. was born in Great Pond, ME in 1880. He graduated valedictorian from Sabattus High School in 1902. He received his law degree from Boston University School of Law. In 1906 he founded and served as the first president of Suffolk University and Suffolk Law School in Boston, an evening law school created to provide an education to all, regardless of class, race or religion. He was also a writer and radio broadcaster for NBC.

Selected Bibliography

  • Law Office And Court Procedure (1910)
  • Ethical Obligations Of The Lawyer (1910)
  • The Educational Octopus: A Fearless Portrayal Of Men And Events In The Old Bay State, 1906-1915 (1915)
  • Building A School : A Fearless Portrayal Of Men And Events In The Old Bay State, 1906-1919 (1919)
  • History Of The Law (1928)

Selected Links

Bachelder, Peter ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Native Mainer Peter Dow Bachelder grew up on the Maine coast and lives in Ellsworth, ME. He graduated from the University of Maine (Orono), worked for a time for the U.S. Weather Bureau, then spent 30 years as Director of Information Services for the Maine Publicity Bureau. For several years he wrote a column about shipwrecks and lighthouses for the Portland Evening Express. He has written or co-written several books about Maine lighthouses, the Maine coast and related subjects.

Bibliography

  • Lighthouses of Casco Bay (1975)
  • Lighthouses and Lightships of Casco Bay (1995)
  • Shipwrecks and Maritime Disasters of the Maine Coast (1997)
  • The Great Steel Pier: an Illustrated History of the Old Orchard Beach Pier (1998)
  • Four Short Blasts : The Gale Of 1898 And The Loss Of The Steamer Portland with Mason Philip Smith (1998)
  • Steam To The Summit : The Green Mountain Railway Bar Harbor's Remarkable Cog Railroad (2005)

Selected Resources

Bartlett, Arthur (1901 - 1964)

Genre: Children's Literature

Arthur Charles Bartlett was born in Norway, ME in 1901 and graduated from Bowdoin College in 1922. He worked as a newspaperman for the Portland Press Herald, the Edmonton Alberta Bulletin, The Sioux City Tribune and the Boston Herald and also as a contributor to American Magazine where he was also and associate editor and staff writer. He was best known, however, for his books about dogs written for boys mostly during the 1920's and '30's.

Bibliography

  • Spunk, Leader Of The Dog Team: Being The Story Of A Dog Who Won His Place At The Head Of The Dog Team (1926)
  • The Sea Dog (1927)
  • Skipper the Guide Dog (1928)
  • Game Legs: the Biography of a Horse with a Heart (1928)
  • The Runaway Dog Team (1929)
  • Gumpy--Son Of Spunk: The Story Of A Little Sled Dog With A Big Heart (1930)
  • General Jim: the Story of a Horse (1931)
  • Pal: the Story of a Dog Who Lived up to His Name (1932)
  • A Son of the Wild Pack (1934)
  • Yankee Doodle: the Story of a Pioneer Boy and His Dog (1935)
  • Pilgrim and Pluck: Dogs of the Mayflower (1936)
  • Hustler: the Farm Dog (1937)
  • 4H Cowboy (1938)
  • Find Your Own Frontier (1940)
  • Sergeant Squiffy: Army Dog (1941)
  • Baseball And Mr. Spalding: The History And Romance Of Baseball (1951)

Selected Resources

Beattie, Ann (1947 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

Short story writer and novelist Ann Beattie was born and raised in Washington D.C. and Ann Arbor MD and lives part time in York, ME. She received her bachelor's degree from American University and her master's from the University of Connecticut. Her short stories have appeared numerous times in the New Yorker and has written several novels. She teaches at the University of Virginia where she holds the Edgar Allan Poe Chair of the Department of English and Creative Writing.

Selected Bibliography

Novels

  • Alex Katz (1987)
  • The Doctor's House (2002)
  • Walks With Men (2010)

Short Stories

  • Park City (1998)
  • Perfect Recall (2001)
  • Follies (2005)

Duina, Francesco (1969 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Sociologist and author Francesco Duina teaches at Bates College and lives in Cumberland, ME. He was born and lived in Italy until he was 14. He received his B.A. in political science and his M.A. in social sciences from the University of Chicago; his M.A. and his Ph.D. in sociology from Harvard. He is the chair of the Department of Sociology at Bates College. His research fields are in economic sociology, international political economy, historical institutionalism, globalization, comparative regional integration, and the sociology of culture. He has written extensively for academic journals and has written several books.

Selected Bibliography

  • Harmonizing Europe : Nation-States Within The Common Market (1999)
  • The Social Construction Of Free Trade : The European Union, NAFTA, And MERCOSUR (2006)
  • Winning : Reflections On An American Obsession (2011)

Selected Links

Blair, Farnham ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Poet, author and essayist Farnham Blair was born in Washington D.C. and lives in Blue Hill, ME. He received his undergraduate degree in English literature and art history from Yale and an MA in English from Georgetown University.

Bibliography

  • The Blue Line : Essays On Landscape And Narrative (1989)
  • Immanent Green: Poems (1991)
  • The Movie Queen and Other Poems (1996)
  • Art Notes: Essays and Observations (1999)
  • Peripheral Visions : Memoirs Of A Washington Childhood (2004)

Breton, Laurie (1954 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Romance Novel

Romantic suspense author Laurie Breton is a native Mainer who lives in Augusta, ME. She graduated from Gardiner High School and has attended the University of Maine at Augusta. She is also an artist, wife, mother and grandmother.

Bibliography

  • Coming Home (2000)
  • Final Exit (c2003)
  • Mortal Sin (c2004)
  • Lethal Lies (c2005)
  • Criminal Intent (c2006)
  • Point of Departure (c2007)
  • Black Widow (2007)
  • Die Before I Wake (c2008)

Brooks, Noah (1830 - 1903)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Journalist and editor Noah Brooks was born in Castine, ME. He lived in Illinois and California and in 1862, moved to Washington D.C. to cover Washington for the Sacramento Daily Union. He was a good friend of both President and Mrs. Lincoln and was a frequent visitor to the Lincoln White House. He covered the 1864 Democratic National Convention in Chicago for the Daily Union but also reported back directly to Lincoln in private correspondence. He used the 258 dispatches, personal observations and interviews to write what is considered and indispensable book about Lincoln's Washington. He died in 1903 in Pasadena, CA.

Selected Bibliography

  • Statesmen (1893)
  • Washington in Linoln's Time (c1895)
  • Henry Knox, a Soldier of the Revolution; Major-General in the Continental Army, Washington's Chief of Artillery, First Secretary of War under the Constitution, Founder of the Society of the Cincinnati; 1750-1806 (1900)
  • First Across the Continent; the Story of the Exploring Expedition of Lewis and Clark in 1803-4-5 (1901)

Selected Links

Brown, Harry (1917 - 1986)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction, Poetry

Poet, novelist and Academy Award-winning screen-writer Harry Brown was born in Portland, ME. He attended Harvard but dropped out in his sophomore year to write poetry. In 1941, he published his acclaimed poem The Poem of Bunker Hill. In July of 1941, he joined the Army Air Corps and the staff of Yank magazine where he wrote under the nom de plume of Pfc. Artie Geengroin. He wrote the book A Walk in the Sun upon which the movie A Place in the Sun was based. He also wrote the Academy Award-winning screenplay for that film. He died in 1986 of emphysema.

Selected Bibliography

Books and Poems

  • The End of a Decade (1940)
  • The Poem of Bunker Hill (1941)
  • The Violent : New Poems (c1943)
  • A Walk in the Sun (1944)
  • Artie Greengroin, Pfc (1945)

Screenplays

  • The Sands of Iwo Jima (1949)
  • A Place in the Sun Academy Award (1951)
  • Ocean's Eleven (1960)

Brown, Ina (1902 - )

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, Poetry

Ina Ladd was born in Sebec, Maine to Walter S. and Carolyn Loring Ladd. She was educated at Foxcroft Academy and Shaw Business College in Portland. She was secretary to three chief justices and one associate justice of the Supreme Judicial Court of Maine. In 1955, she became the personal secretary of John W. Ballou of the firm Mitchell-Ballou. She was married to Harold P. Brown and in the late 1940s co-founded the Bangor Civic Theater, of which she was a past president and active member.

During this time she wrote four plays and also directed, produced, and acted in several productions and was awarded a distinguished service trophy. Brown served three terms as president of the Poetry Fellowship of Maine, twelve years as executive secretary, and two terms as member of Board of Review. Her other positions include vice president of the National League of American Pen Women, Pine Tree Branch; member of Maine Writers Research Club; and member of Radio-TV Women.

Brown published several volumes of poetry. She has been listed in Who's Who in American Women and the International Who's Who in Poetry. Brown has won more contest prizes at the Maine Writers Conference over ten years than any other writer, including the judges' First Prize and the Richard Recchia Award, for her contribution to poetry in Maine. She died in 1985. (Thanks to UNE Maine Women Writers Collection).

Selected Bibliography

Plays

  • Dear David
  • Peace and Quiet
  • The Grass is Always Greener
  • Dark Music

Poetry

  • Merry-Go-Round (1943)
  • Just for Luck (1946)
  • More of the Same (1949)
  • As Time Goes By (1951)
  • Homespun (1959)
  • Leaves on the Wind (1963)

Selected Links

Wismer, Donald (1946 - )

Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy

Science fiction author, Donald Wismer lives in Maine. He was born December 27, 1946 and currently is employed by the Office of the Maine Secretary of State.

Selected Bibliography

  • Starluck 1982
  • Warrior's Planet1987
  • Planet of the Dead 1988
  • Roil of Stars 1991
  • Lion in the Sky 2019

Selected Resources

Curtis, Alice (1863 - 195?)

Genre: Children's Literature, Young Adult

Children's and young adult author Alice Turner Curtis was born in Sullivan, ME. She lived most of her life in Boston, MA.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Little Maid of Province Town (1913)
  • A Little Maid of Massachusetts Colony (1914)
  • A Little Maid of Narragansett (1915)
  • A Little Maid of Bunker Hill (1916)
  • A Little Maid of Ticonderoga (1917)
  • A Little Maid of Old Connecticut (1918)
  • A Little Maid of Old Philadelphia (1919)
  • A Little Maid of Old Maine (1920)
  • A Yankee Girl at Fort Sumter (1920)
  • A Little Maid of Old New York (1921)
  • A Yankee Girl at Bull Run (1921)
  • A Little Maid of Virginia (1922)
  • A Yankee Girl at Shiloh (1922)
  • A Little Maid of Maryland (1923)
  • A Yankee Girl at Antietam (1923)
  • A Little Maid of Mohawk Valley (1924)
  • A Little Maid of Monmouth (1925)
  • A Little Maid of Nantucket (1926)
  • A Yankee Girl at Lookout Mountain (1928)
  • A Yankee Girl at the Battle of the Wilderness (1929)
  • A Yankee Girl at Richmond (1930)
  • A Little Maid of Quebec (1936)
  • A Little Maid of New Orleans (1949)
  • A Little Maid of Valley Forge (1951)
  • A Little Maid of South Carolina (1952)
  • A Little Maid of Fort Pitt (1953

Selected Links

Inglehart, Donna ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Young Adult

Donna Walsh Inglehart received her B.A. from the University of Massachusetts and her M.A. from Middlebury College. She taught at Northfield Mount Hermon School in Mount Hermon, MA, where she was awarded the Elizabeth Rueckert Fellowship for Excellence in Teaching and is now Chair of the English Department at Hebron Academy in Hebron, ME.

Bibliography

  • Breaking the Ring (1991)
  • Grindstone (2010)
  • One in a Thousand with Ian Coristine (2012)

Ulmer, Wendy (1950 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's author Wendy Ulmer is a former music and English teacher who currently spends her time writing or running her quilt shop. She lives in Arrowsic, ME.

Bibliography

  • A Campfire for Cowboy Billy (1997)
  • A Isn't for Fox: An Isn't Alphabet (2007)
  • Zero, Zilch, Nada: Counting to None (2010)

Hammond, Karen ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Karen Hammond was born near Boston and vacationed in Maine since childhood. She has lived year round in Maine for the past 15 years. An award-winning nonfiction writer and poet, her work appears in leading national magazines and newspapers and in literary magazines. She writes on a variety of topics including New England lifestyle and history, food and wine, travel, women's health, and parenting. She lives in South Bristol.

Selected Bibliography

  • Backroads & byways of New England : drives, day trips & weekend excursions (2011)

de Mauriac, Gwenn ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Historical fiction writer, painter and teacher Gwenn R. de Mauriac lives in Wiscasset, ME. She is a part of the English faculty at Southern New Hampshire University and a member of the Stewards of the Sheepscot. She has published novels, as well as plays, short stories and poems.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ships Passing (2007)
  • Angel's Flight (2010)

Morgan, Janet ( - )

Genre: Mystery

Janet Morgan was born and raised in coastal Maine. She earned a BA in English from UMA (2001) while working full-time as a librarian. She is a member of Sisters in Crime, the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance, and the Wiscasset Public Library Writing Group. She has been published in several journals.

Bibliography

  • Poetic Justice: A Killdeer Farm Mystery (2008)
  • Composted Tyrant: A Killdeer Farm Mystery (2010)

Smith, Anne ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Anne Day Smith began her writing career in high school, and has been specializing in miniatures since the late 1970?s when she began writing and taking photographs for several magazines devoted to the hobby, as well as other magazines and newspapers. She has traveled extensively around the country, covering miniature shows, interviewing artisans, and visiting miniature collections.

She is the author of four books about miniatures and has contributed to several others.

She is a member of the National Association of Miniature Enthusiasts? Academy of Honor, and has served as its Chairman. She is also a member of the International Guild of Miniature Artisans, and has served on its Board of Trustees.

Anne is also an ardent collector of miniatures and still has her childhood dollhouse. She and her husband Gerry, a retired retail executive, have three grown sons and seven grandchildren. They live in a restored 18th century house in Dresden, Maine, with their two West Highland White Terriers.

Bibliography

  • Interior Design in Miniature (1986)
  • Masters in Miniature (1987)
  • The Andrews Collection: Personal Treasures (1988)
  • The Period Rooms of Ruth McChesney (1997)
  • Treasures in Miniature (1993) (contributor)
  • Golden Christmas: Building a Miniature Masterpiece by Brooke Tucker (1996) (contributor)

Miller, Dorcas (1949 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Outdoorswoman, naturalist, instructor and author Dorcas S. Miller lives in Chelsea, ME. She is a former contributing editor to Backpacker magazine's "Moveable Feast" column, has worked as an Outward Bound instructor and as a whitewater rafting guide.

Bibliography

  • The Maine Coast, A Nature Lover's Guide (1979)
  • Winter Weed Finder: A Guide to Dry Plants in Winter (1989)
  • The Stop Junk Mail Book (1991)
  • Good Food for Camp & Trail: All-Natural Recipes for Delicious Meals Outdoors (1993)
  • Stars of the First People: Native American Star Myths and Constellations (1997)
  • Backcountry Cooking: From Pack to Plate in 10 Minutes (1998)
  • Adventurous Women: The Inspiring Lives of Nine Early Outdoorswomen (1999)
  • Rescue: Stories of Survival from Land and Sea (2000) (editor)
  • Kayaking the Maine Coast: A Paddler's Guide to Day Trips from Kittery to Cobscook (2000)
  • Backpacker, the Magazine of Wilderness Travel: More Backcountry Cooking: Moveable Feasts from the Experts (2002)
  • Constellation Finder: A Guide to Patterns in the Night Sky with Star Stories from Around the World (2005)

Spooner, Emeric ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Writer, investigator and librarian Emeric Spooner lives in Bucksport, ME. His interest lies in the unresolved mysteries of Maine's history.

Bibliography

  • In Search Of Sarah Ware: Reinvestigating Murder And Conspiracy In A Maine Village (2008)
  • In Search Of Melissa Thayer: Reinvestigating The Trim Triple Homicide (2008)
  • In Search Of Maine Archaeology: An Amateur's Guide To Artifact Identification (2008)
  • Return To Smuttynose Island: And Other Maine Axe Murders (2009)
  • In Search Of Maine Urban Legends (2009)
  • In Search Of Mattie Hackett: A True Maine Unsolved Murder Mystery (2010)
  • Maine Gravestones And Flags: Honoring Our Heroes (2010)

Gannaway, Steve ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Author and educator Steve Gannaway has spent more than twenty years as a high school teacher in North Dakota and in Maine. He now teaches adult education in Sanford, Maine. He has earned degrees in theology and religious studies from the University of St. Thomas and Providence College, and has been writing poetry for more than forty years. He lives in Springvale, Maine with his wife and two children.

Bibliography

  • Journeys (2010)

Proper, Ida (1873 - 1957)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Ida Sedgwick Proper was born in 1873 on a farm in Iowa. She attended Bethany College, an Episcopal school for girls, in Kansas. She studied and taught art at schools in New Jersey and Pennsylvania; from 1919 to 1922 she was on the faculty of the University of Puerto Rico; and she worked in libraries in Seattle and New York City. In 1925 or 1926 she first came to Monhegan Island in Maine on a vacation and bought a house which became her home for thirty years. As a permanent resident of Monhegan, she continued to sketch and paint, conducted an art school on the island, and served as librarian and registrar or town clerk. Her study of the background of early settlers led to an interest in 16th century travel, politics, intrigues, and literature. She was also a renowned artist. She died on Monhegan in 1957.

Bibliography

  • Monhegan, the cradle of New England (1930)
  • Our elusive Willy (1954)

Potter, Dawn (1964 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Dawn Potter is associate director of the Frost Place Conference on Poetry and Teaching, held each summer at Robert Frost's home in Franconia, New Hampshire. She has published two collections of poetry as well as the award-winning book Tracing Paradise: Two Years in Harmony with John Milton, a memoir about copying out every single word of Paradise Lost. Potter lives in Harmony, Maine.

Bibliography

  • Boy Land and Other Poems (2004)
  • Tracing Paradise: Two Years in Harmony with John Milton (2009) Winner of the Emerging Writer's Fellowship from the Writers' Center in Washington, D.C.
  • How the Crimes Happened: Poems (2010)
  • Same Old Story (2014)
  • The Conversation: Learning to be a Poet (2015)
  • Chestnut Ridge: Poems (2019)

Rogers, Annie "Lou" (1879 - 1952)

Genre: Children's Literature

Annie (Lou) Rogers was born in Patten, Maine. After attending art school in Massachusetts and the Art Students League in New York, Rogers became a leading cartoonist, her pictures appearing in The Judge, Ladies' Home Journal, New York Call and the New York Tribune. A committed supporter of women's suffrage, she contributed cartoons to leading suffragist magazines, took part in suffrage lecture tours, and was a well-known soap-box orator in Times Square. She wrote and illustrated two adventure books for children and in the 1930s hosted a weekly NBC radio program, Animal News Club. Lou Rogers died in 1952.

Bibliography

  • The Rise of the Red Alders (1928)
  • Ska-Denge (Beaver for Revenge) (1929)

Marriner, Ernest (1891 - 1983)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Dean Cummings Marriner was a native of Bridgton, ME. He graduated from Colby College in 1913 and received his master's degree from Suffolk University (Boston). He served as librarian at Colby as well as Professor of Bibliography from 1923 to 1929 and was a professor of English there for 31 years. He was also Colby's first Dean of Men and first Dean of the Faculty. He died in 1983.

Selected Bibliography

  • Kennebec Yesterdays (1954)
  • Remembered Maine (1957)
  • History of Colby College (1963)
  • The Man Of Mayflower Hill; A Biography Of Franklin W. Johnson (1967)
  • The Strider Years : An Extension Of The History Of Colby College (1980)

Selected Resources

Crowell, Marnie (1939? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Natural history writer and biologist Marnie Reed Crowell was born and raised in New Jersey and makes her home on Deer Isle, ME. Her works have appeared in Down East, Audubon, Natural History, Redbook, and Readers Digest. She was commissioned to write a poem for the blessing of the opening of the Penobscot Narrows Bridge.

Selected Bibliography

  • Greener Pastures (1973)
  • Great Blue: The Odyssey of a Great Blue Heron (1980)
  • Quick Key to Birds of Deer Isle (1997) with Kenneth L. Crowell
  • Beads & String: A Maine Island Pilgrimage (2008)

Wintle, Frederick (1952 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Fred Wintle was born and raised in Dexter, ME. He attended and graduated from Dexter schools (1971). After serving 20 years in the Air Force, he returned to settle in Garland, ME.

Bibliography

  • When Weavers Wove: Short Stories of a Small, New England Mill Town (2007)

Bachofner, Carol ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet Carol Willette Bachofner lives in Rockland, ME. She received her MFA in Poetry from Vermont College and has been a professor of college-level English and a midwife.

Bibliography

  • Daughter of the Ardennes Forest (2007)
  • Breakfast at the Brass Compass: Poems of Mid Coast Maine (2009)

Labbe, Rodney (1952 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Freelance writer Rodney Labbe was born, raised and lives in Waterville, ME. He graduated from the Waterville school system in 1971. He received his BA in Filmmaking from USM (1981 Magna cum Laude) and his Masters in Creative Writing from the University of Maine (1985). He has taught writing classes and Kennebec Valley Community College and the University of Maine at Augusta. A freelance writer for 27 years, he began his career in 1984 writing for the college paper, then branched out to writing for magazines (national and international) and newspapers. His credits include magazines such as Fangoria, Films of the Golden Age, Classic Images, Iron Man Magazine, Muscle & Fitness and Flex. In his free time, he gardens and collects vintage Halloween items and 1960's comic books. His first novel is due out in 2011.

Bibliography

  • The Blue Classroom (2014)

Wiggin, Eric (1939 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Young Adult

Pastor, novelist and self-help writer Eric E. Wiggin was born and raised in Albion, ME. He pastored in Palermo, ME, taught English at Waterville Junior High School, and taught at Glen Cove Bible College. He has published articles in the Maine Sunday Telegram and the Kennebec Journal. He lives in Fruitport, MI.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Hound for Hannah (1995)
  • Mystery of the Sunken Steamboat (1995)
  • The Mysterious Stranger (1995)
  • The Lesson of the Ancient Bones (1996)
  • The Secret of the Old Well (1997)
  • The Texas Rodeo Showdown (1998)

Costello, Frederick (1851 - 1921)

Genre: Young Adult

F. H. (Frederick Hankerson) Costello was born, raised and lived in Bangor, ME. He was the author of young adult adventure novels.

Bibliography

  • The Sale of Mrs. Adral: A Novel (1889)
  • The Two on Galley Island (1893)
  • Master Ardick Buccaneer (1896)
  • Under the Rattlesnake Flag (1898)
  • On Fighting Decks in 1812 (1899)
  • A Tar of the Old School (1900)
  • Nelson's Yankee Boy (1904)
  • Sure-Dart: Story of Strange Hunters and Strange Game in the Days of Monsters (1909)
  • The Girl With Two Selves(1913)
  • Morgan's Youngest Rifleman (1913)

Gordon, John (1872 - ?)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Recluse, salvager, inventor, printer's devil, publisher and writer John Gordon lived on Vinalhaven. He was born in 1872 in Huntley, Scotland and his family moved to Port Dover, Ontario, Canada (located on the Canadian side of Lake Erie) in 1880. On Vinalhaven, he was known as a recluse who collected scrap metal and rubber to sell. He also created a small (18"X 12" X 12") printing press which he used to print his own pamphlets and books which also included illustrations from his hand-carved (with a jack knife) woodcuts.

Selected Bibliography

  • Lucky Jane: Or, Saved from a Horrible Fate (1930)
  • Pickled Percy: Or, the Spoiled Child (1930)
  • Confessions Of Sandy McWhiffle, Famous Inventor (1931)
  • A Potfull Of Vinalhaven Applesass (1937)
  • The Burning Of The Royal Tar Near Vinalhaven, Oct. 21st, 1836 (1937?)
  • The Gordon Hand Press (1942)

Selected Resources

Material from Maine State Library files

Bartlett, Stanley (1902 - 1937)

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Stanley Foss Bartlett was born in Leeds, Maine. The family later moved to Locke?s Mills, Maine, and he graduated from Woodstock High School in Bryant Pond. Bartlett attended the University of Idaho Forestry School, and studied briefly at the Portland Art Museum and Pratt Institute in New York. In 1926 he was hired to work on The Northern, the magazine published by Great Northern Paper Company. In addition to doing art and editorial work, he also traveled to various Great Northern logging camps as a sort of social worker to the loggers there. Stories heard in the camps were incorporated into his second book, a collection of short stories called Beyond the Sowdyhunk, published in 1937.

Bibliography

  • Lost Hours (1924)
  • Beyond the Sowdyhunk (1937)
  • Silent Songs (1940)

Selected Resources

Thompson, Ruth (1908 - 1998)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Ruth Hunt Thompson was born in Island Falls, grew up in Bangor and retired to Hancock, ME. She was a graduate of Smith College (1930)and became the wife of a foreign service officer in 1931. For the next 38 years, she lived in 8 different countries. She worked briefly with the French Resistance during World War II, ran two American schools (Paris, 1945-46 and Prague, 1950-52) and helped to organize the Association of the American Foreign Service Women in Washington D.C. during the 1960's. After her retirement to Hancock, ME, she co-wrote a book with her father detailing his years spent in Northern Greenland as the physician to the Crocker Land Expedition (1913-1917).

Bibliography

  • North to the horizon : searching for Peary's Crocker Land with Harrison J. Hunt (1980)

Stevens, Irving (1910 - 1999)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Author, poet and Yankee storyteller Irving "FishBones" Stevens was born in Surry and lived in Corinna, ME. He "rode the rails" as teenager, hoboing across the country during the 1930's. He served as a radio repairman in the Army Air Corps during WWII and worked for Remington Arms, Bullard Machine Tool (Connecticut) and in the drill room at FayScott in Dexter for 15 years. He is known for the invention of "Irving's Fly Dope" an insect repellant he made and marketed beginning in 1962.

Selected Bibliography

  • Fish Bones: Hoboing in the 1930's (1982)
  • Mandy's Washtub and other Stories (1992)

Kimball, Marrae (2000? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Reader, painter, musician and author Marrae Kimball lives in Norway ME with her family. She wrote her first stories, about her favorite cat, when she was three years old. She published her first book at the age of ten when she was a fifth grader. She is in the sixth grade at Guy E. Rowe Elementary School in Norway.

Bibliography

  • Guaranteed Success for Grade School: 50 Easy Things You Can Do Today! (2010)
  • Guaranteed Success for Kindergarten: 50 Easy Things You Can Do Today! (2010)

Selected Links

Raines, Rebecca (1952 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Military historian Rebecca Raines was born in Belfast, ME, attended Searsport schools and graduated from the University of Maine (Orono) in 1974 with a BA in History. She moved to Washington DC in 1977 where she earned her MA in American History at Georgetown University (1981). She has published articles in Maine Historical Society Quarterly, and Army Communicator, the official bulletin of the Army Signal Corps.

Selected Bibliography

  • Getting the Message Through: A Branch History of the U.S. Army Signal Corps (1996)
  • Signal Corps (Part of the Army Lineage Series) (2005)

Selected Links

Taylor, Arthur (1925 - 2010)

Genre: Illustrator

Arthur J. Taylor was born and raised in South Boston. He attended the Museum of Fine Arts and graduated from Vesper George School of Art in Boston where he met his future wife, Ruth, of Lee, ME. After a successful commercial art career in Boston, they moved to Maine in 1966. He became a renowned wildlife watercolor artist, rod-maker and conservationist.

Bibliography

  • Penobscot River Renaissance: Restoring America's Premier Atlantic Salmon Fishery (illustrator) by James E. Butler (1992)

Turner, Frances (1882 - ?)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Educator, poet, author and artist Frances Wright Turner was born and raised in Richmond, ME. She attended Richmond schools, graduated from what was then the State Normal School at Farmington (now UMF), taught in several Maine schools, and was an editor for the Rockland Courier-Gazette and the Ellsworth American. She lived at various times in Ellsworth, Hampden and Union, ME. She wrote award-winning poetry, stories for children and novels. She was also an adept painter of watercolors.

Selected Bibliograpy

  • Drifting Leaves: A Collection of Poems (1926)
  • Star Dust (1930)
  • Salt of the Earth (1941)
  • Follow the River (1957)

Selected Resources

Woolson, Abba (1838 - 1921)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Abba Louisa Goold Woolson was born in Windham, ME. She graduated from Portland High School for Girls, and married that same year. She traveled extensively and lectured on topics such as English Literature and Historic Cities of Spain. She was at one time professor of belles-lettres at the Mount Auburn Ladies' Institute in Cincinnati, OH, "lady-principal" of the high school in Haverhill, MA and an assistant in the high school in Concord NH. She published many articles and informal essays in publications such as the Boston Journal.

Selected Bibliography

  • Woman in American Society (1873)
  • Dress-Reform: A Series Of Lectures: Delivered In Boston, On Dress As It Affects The Health Of Women (editor) (1874)
  • Browsing Among Books, and Other Essays (1881)
  • George Eliot and her Heroines: A Study (1886)
  • With Garlands Green (1915)

Peirce, Waldo (1884 - 1970)

Genre: Illustrator

Artist and illustrator Waldo Peirce was born in Bangor, ME. He attended Phillips-Andover and graduated from Harvard in 1908. He studied at the New York Art Students League, the Julian Academy in Paris and also in Spain and in Rome. He was an ambulance driver during WWI in France (1915-1917) and he lived in Europe until 1930 when he returned to his native Bangor and Searsport, wintering in Newburyport, MA.

Selected Bibliography

  • Squawky And Bawky By Lynne Lofting (1939)
  • The Magic Bed-Knob, Or, How To Become A Witch In Ten Easy Lessons By Mary Norton (1943)
  • The Children's Hour (1944)
  • Waldo Peirce (1945)

Burleigh, Clarence (1864 - 1910)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Young Adult

Clarence Blendon Burleigh was born in Linneus, ME in 1864. A graduate of Bowdoin College, he was State Printer and Editor of the Kennebec Journal and son to Governor Edwin Chick Burleigh.

Bibliography

  • The Smugglers of Chestnut (1891)
  • Bowdoin '87: A History of Undergraduate Days: Together with Brief Sketches of Members of the Class Since Graduation (1900)
  • The Camp On Letter K; Or, Two Live Boys In Northern Maine (1906)
  • The Kenton Pines, Or, Raymond Benson In College (1907)
  • Raymond Benson At Krampton, Or, Two Live Boys At Preparatory School (1907)
  • All Among The Loggers ; Or, Norman Carver's Winter In A Lumber Camp (1908)
  • With Pickpole And Peavey, Or, Two Live Boys On The East Branch Drive (1909)
  • The Young Guide, Or, Two Live Boys In The Maine Woods (1910)

Bush, Barbara (1925 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Former First Lady and author Barbara Bush lives part time at the family's estate on Walkers Point in Kennebunkport, ME. She was born Barbara Pierce in New York, NY and grew up in Rye, NY. She attended Rye schools, graduated from Ashley Hall, a boarding high school, and attended Smith College, dropping out after her freshman year to marry George Herbert Walker Bush. She was a Navy wife during WWII and, for most of her life, a wife and mother. She became First Lady when George H. W. Bush was elected president for two terms, 1989-1993. She has written books for children as well as memoirs.

Bibliography

  • C. Fred's Story (1984)
  • Millie's Book: As Dictated to Barbara Bush (1990)
  • Barbara Bush: A Memoir (1994)
  • Reflections: Life After the White House (2003)

Selected Links

Bush, George (1924 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

President George Herbert Walker Bush was born in Milton MA and lives part time at the family estate on Walkers Point in Kennebunkport, ME. He graduated from Phillips Andover, was a decorated Navy pilot during WWII, then graduated from Yale. He worked in the oil business in Texas, then ran for office and was elected to Congress for two terms. He also was Ambassador to the United Nations, Chairman of the Republican National Committee, Chief of the U. S. Liaison Office in the People's Republic of China, and Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. He served as Ronald Reagan's vice President and was elected for two terms as President -- 1989 and 1993.

Selected Bibliography

  • Looking Forward (1987) with Victor Gold
  • Putting People First : How We Can All Change America (1992) with President Bill Clinton Vice President Al Gore
  • A World Transformed (1998) with Brent Scowcroft
  • All The Best, George Bush : My Life In Letters And Other Writings (1999)
  • Heartbeat: George Bush in His Own Words (2001)

Selected Links

Bushell, Agnes (1949 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Author, educator and political activist Agnes Bushell lives in Portland, ME. She was born in Queens, NY and educated at the University of Chicago and the University of Southern Maine and holds degrees in Philosophy and Literacy Education. She has been on the faculty of the Maine College of Art since 1985. She has written several novels and has contributed articles to journals such as Down East.

Selected Bibliography

  • Shadowdance (1989)
  • Local Deities: A Novel (1990)
  • Death by Crystal: A Johannah Wilder Mystery (1993)
  • Days of the Dead (1995)
  • The Enumerator (1997)
  • In the Garden of Nicholas Treeson (2003)
  • Mothers and Sons (2004)
  • After Mistra (2004)
  • Asian Vespers (2005)
  • The Oracle Pool (2020)

Bushnell, Adelyn (1889 - 1953)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction

Actress, playwright and novelist Adelyn Bushnell was born in Thomaston, ME. Homeschooled in the classics by her father, she graduated early from high school. In 1908 she entered the Leland Powers school in Boston, MA. Encouraged by one of her teachers, she joined an acting stock company in New Jersey in 1910. She had her first starring role in 1911 and continued to star in plays until 1926 when she lost her voice due to overwork. She then concentrated on writing -- first plays for the stage and for radio, then novels. She died in Los Angeles, CA in 1953.

Selected Bibliography

  • Tide-Rode (1947)
  • Eight Radio Plays: For Classroom Use And Amateur Broadcast with Marshall Bradford (1947)
  • Rock Haven (1948)
  • Pay the Piper: A Novel (1950)
  • Strange Gift (1951)

Selected Resources

Bailey, Jan (1944 - )

Genre: Poetry

Award-winning poet Jan Bailey lives on Monhegan Island, ME. She is a winner of the Sue Saniel Elkind Poetry Prize from Kalliope and the Elinor Benedict Poetry Prize from Passages North, and is a Pushcart Prize nominee and South Carolina Poetry Fellow. She grew up in the foothills of South Carolina and holds an MFA from Vermont College.

Selected Bibliography

  • Paper Clothes: [Poems] (1995)
  • Heart of the Other: Island Poems (1998)
  • Midnight in the Guestroom: Poems (2004)
  • Sailing Maine (2006)

Baker, James (1848 - 1925)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Pioneering educator and author James Hutchins Baker was born and raised in Harmony, ME. He received his B.A. from Bates College (1873) and became a local schoolmaster and high school principal. Due to reasons of health, he moved west and in 1874 was appointed principal of East Denver (CO) high school, where he remained for the next 17 years. In 1892, he became the third president of the University of Colorado in Boulder, an institution only 15 years old and with only 66 students. When he retired as president emeritus in 1914, he had established a graduate department, a law school, a college of engineering, and the student body numbered over 1000. He was called "The Eliot of the West" after Charles Eliot of Harvard and was recognized for advancing the cause of education in the West.

Selected Bibliography

  • Education and Life: Papers and Addresses (1900)
  • American Problems: Essays and Addresses (1907)
  • Educational Aims and Civic Needs (1913)
  • American University Progress And College Reform Relative To School And Society (1916)
  • After the War--What? (1918)
  • Of Himself and Other Things (1922)

Selected Links

Fahy, Davene ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Davene Fahy received her B.A. and M.A. in speech pathology from Temple University in Philadelphia, PA and has been a speech-language pathologist and special education teacher for over 40 years in Philadelphia and in Maine. She lives in Thomaston with her husband, author Christopher Fahy.

Bibliography

  • Charlie Who Couldn't Say His Name (2004)
  • Anthony Best (2010)
  • The Boy Who Thought He Was a Plane (2010)

Selected Links

Gott, Patricia ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Patricia Probert Gott was raised in Strong and lives in Norway, ME. She graduated Cum Laude from Becker Junior College in MA in 1963 and worked for the CIA in Langley, VA. She has been a business entrepreneur in Maine, traveled widely, and she has worked for several summers as a lady wrangler in Montana and Wyoming.

Select Bibliography

  • Metamorphosis: My Journal of Growth and Change: Autobiography of Patricia R. Probert Gott (2006)
  • So You Wanna Be a Cowgirl (2007)
  • Cowgirl Days (2008)
  • Horse Tails by Shasta (2008)
  • Horse Tails by Mookie (2009)
  • The Dayes of Wyoming (2010)

Callahan, Steve (1952 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Steve Callahan was born in Needham, MA. He summered many years on the coast of Maine and later moved to Lamoine ME in 1977. In high school in the latter 1960s, Steve taught himself celestial navigation and the principles of boat design, began singlehanded sailing, and helped build a 40-foot trimaran. He earned a degree in philosophy and psychology at Syracuse University in 1974 and an associates degree in small craft naval architecture from Yacht Design Institute schools in Blue Hill, ME. After university he spent more than five years boat building and repairing all kinds of boats, from traditional wood boats to composite multihulls. For a decade beginning in the latter 1970s he turned to designing boats. At Delta Marine group, he aided Bob Wallstrom designing a number of boats to 45 feet, and built a small portfolio of his own designs. He also taught design at Yacht Design Institute (YDI) where he was lead instructor and helped update and illustrate design texts, authoring one about multihulls. At YDI, he helped to build both correspondence and residential schools into accredited programs, which were later incorporated into Westlawn Institute?s design curriculum. As an author, he is best known for his book Adrift, chronicling his adventure adrift in a life raft for 76 days, but has written for several journals, including Sail, Sailing, Sailor, Small Boat Journal, Yachting World, WoodenBoat, Professional Boatbuilder and Cruising World.

Selected Bibliography

  • Adrift: 76 Days Lost at Sea (1986)
  • Capsized (1993)

Bachman, Richard ( - )

Genre: Horror

SEE: King, Stephen

Bibliography

  • Thinner (1984)
  • The Regulators (1996)

Badham, Michael ( - 2002)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Michael Badham was born in Australia but his family moved to England when he was three. He attended the Britannia Royal Naval College in Dartmouth, served as a midshipman in the battleship Duke of York, commanded submarines and then returned to the Royal Naval College as a staff member.

He and his family crossed the Atlantic in a converted lifeboat and he chartered in the Caribbean for several years during the 1960's. He then worked as a boat builder in Ireland for a while before moving to Bath, ME where he became known as a yacht designer and writer.

Bibliography

  • My Road Leads Me Seawards (1997)
  • Sailor's Secrets: Advice from the Masters (1997)
  • The Moose Hunt Murders and Ellis in Balcutha, Two Novellas (1999)
  • A Fatal Disease: A Novel (2001)

Bailey, Elisabeth ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Elisabeth Tova Bailey is a Maine resident who has written short stories, essays and a memoir. She has received several Pushcart Prize nominations and a Notable Essay Listing in Best American Essays.

Her work has appeared in The Missouri Review, Northwest Review, and the Sycamore Review.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating (2010)

Selected Resources

Clough, Fred ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Fred Clough is a retired marketing executive who now sells worldwide fishing trips. He is a registered Master Maine Guide and holds an MBA from New Hampshire College and a BA in economics from the University of Maine Orono.

Bibliography

  • Sal T. Dog: One Stormy Night at Pickle Light (1990)

Knickerbocker, Frances (1887 - 1973)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Frances W. (Cutler) Knickerbocker was born and raised in Bangor, ME. She attended Vassar College (BA, 1909) and the University of Maine (MA, 1911). She published many book reviews, essays and articles and one book. Her diary from her teenage years in Bangor was published, edited by her son, Charles H. Knickerbocker.

Bibliography

  • Free Minds: John Morley and His Friends (1943)
  • The Minister's Daughter: A Time-Exposure Photograph of the Years 1903-04 (1974)

Knickerbocker, Wendy (1948 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Third generation Maine author Wendy Knickerbocker was born and raised in Bar Harbor and lives in Castine, ME. Her father (Charles H. Knickerbocker) and grandmother (Frances W. Knickerbocker) were also Maine authors. She attended Colby College (BA, 1973) and Simmons College Graduate School of Library and Information Science (MS, 1980). She has published some journal and encyclopedia articles in addition to authoring books.

Bibliography

  • Sunday at the Ballpark: Billy Sunday's Professional Baseball Career, 1883-1890 (2000)
  • Bard of the Bethel: The Life and Times of Boston's Father Taylor, 1793-1871 (2014)
  • "Primarily to Show What Outdoor Beauty Can Contribute": Reef Point Gardens 1939-1962 (2018)

York, Dena (1953 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Dena Lynn Winslow York was born in Caribou and raised on a dairy and potato farm in Mapleton, ME. She graduated from Presque Isle High School (1971) and attended the University of ME Presque Isle (BS, 1975), University of Southern Maine (ME, 1988), and the University of Maine (Ph.D, 2000). She was a teacher for many years, winning the IBM Maine Teacher of the Year award in 1989. She lives in Presque Isle.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mapleton, Maine (1980)
  • History of the Greater Ashland, Maine, Area (1983)
  • The County: Land of Promise: a Pictorial History of Aroostook County, Maine (1989)
  • "They lynched Jim Cullen": New England's Only Lynching (2005)

Hawkins, Shaun ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Shaun C. Hawkins was raised in Portland, Maine, received both his BA and MBA from Cornell University, and worked on Wall Street at Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley.

He has returned to Maine and spends his time writing and watching his daughter play college basketball.

Bibliography

  • Honeymoon Junkie: Everything But the Girl (2010)

Janover, Caroline (1943 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Young Adult

Author and educator Caroline Janover was born in Waterbury, CT. In 1950, her parents bought Harbor Island in Muscungus Bay off the coast of Maine and she spent many summers there. After retiring from teaching, she and her husband moved to Damariscotta, ME. She is a retired Learning Disabilities Specialist with more then thirty-five years of diagnostic and remedial experience in both public and private education. She graduated from Sarah Lawrence College and received Master's degrees from Boston University and Fairleigh Dickinson University in the field of special education. Caroline Janover has dyslexia and lectures nationally with humor and insight about the creative talents and academic challenges of children who grow up with ADHD and dyslexia.

Bibliography

  • Josh: a Boy with Dyslexia (1988)
  • Zipper, the Kid with ADHD (1997)
  • How Many Days Until Tomorrow? (2000)

Levinsky, Allan (1934 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Allan Levinsky, a Portland native, is a graduate of the University of Maine and a best- selling author of three books, a historian, and a speaker on historical subjects. He has been a newspaper editor and a radio and television broadcaster. He has worked at the Maine Historical Society as a guide and visitor services coordinator, recently retiring after seventeen years of service. An Air Force veteran, he lives in Portland with his wife

Selected Bibliography

  • At Home With the General: A Visit to The Joshua Chamberlain Museum (2001)
  • A Short History of Portland (2007)
  • The night the sky turned red: the story of the Great Portland Maine Fire of July 4th, 1866, as told by those who lived through it (2014)
  • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow in Portland : the fireside poet of Maine (2015)

Oestreich, Ed (1933 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Poet Ed Oestreich was born in Ashland, PA and lives in Damariscotta,ME. He earned his undergraduate degree in Greek and English Literature from Susquehanna University. He entered the Theological Seminary in Philadelphia where he earned a master's degree and returned to work on a doctorate on Russian Iconography. He vacationed for many years on the coast of Maine and, upon retirement, moved to Damariscotta in 1992.

He has published in various ecumenical journals and, more recently, some of his poetry has appeared in Maine-based chapbooks, and a National Anthology of Poetry.

Bibliography

  • Far From Home (2010)

Schmidt, Mollie (1930 - 2013)

Genre: Children's Literature, Poetry

Marian G. (Mollie) Schmidt lived in Rome, ME. She was a retired psychologist, earned her B.S. from Columbia University, a MALS from the New School for Social Research, an M.A. from Montclair State University, a P.D. and Ph.D. from Fordham University. She was a member of the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators and published poetry in Goose River Anthology.

Bibliography

  • Willem of Holland (2008)
  • Heather (2012)
  • Levi (2012)
  • It Happened in Maine (2013)

Baker, William (1938 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Dr. William J. Baker is history professor emeritus at the University of Maine. He is retired and living in Bass Harbor. He was born in Chattanooga, TN where he grew up "romping among Civil War relics" in the Chickamauga Battle Park near Rossville, GA. He received his B.A. from Furman University,a B.D. from Southeastern Seminary,and a Ph.D. from Cambridge University. He taught briefly at East Tennessee State University, Tusculum College, and the University of North Carolina, Charlotte. His fields of study are Modern British History and Sports History.

Bibliography

  • Beyond Port and Prejudice: Charles Lloyd of Oxford, 1784-1829 (1981)
  • Sports in the Western World (1982, 1988)
  • Jesse Owens: An American Life (1986)
  • If Christ Came to the Olympics (2000)

Baldwin, Sidney (1885 - 1978)

Genre: Children's Literature

Sidney Baldwin was born in Pretoria, IL. She graduated from Smith College in 1910 and did graduate work at Columbia. She began her career in 1898 writing for the Pretoria Star, which was founded by her father, Eugene F. Baldwin. Later, she became a drama critic and wrote the column "In My Opinion" for the Star. Baldwin also wrote for the Ladies' Home Journal, was a commentator on radio programs, and wrote several books (including two on Maine life) and articles. She served as vice president of the Journal-Star and was a regular columnist for the Maine Boothbay Register.

Selected Bibliography

  • Young Prince Hubert (1931)
  • Ben of Old Monhegan: A Boy's Life Among the Fisher Folk Off the Coast of Maine (1933)
  • Robin Rides Away (1934)
  • Casting Off From Boothbay Harbor (1948)
  • Marjorie of Monhegan: A Year in a Girl's Life on a Maine Coast Island (1973)

Related Websites - [Sidney Baldwin's papers at

Selected Resources

Braunstein, Sarah (1976 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Author Sarah Braunstein is a recipient of the Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers' Award. She received her MFA from the Iowa Writers' Workshop and lives in Portland, ME. She was recently named one of ?5 Under 35? fiction writers by the National Book Foundation. She currently teaches at Harvard University Extension School and the Stanford Online Writer?s Studio. She is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College, and holds an MFA from the Iowa Writers? Workshop and an MSW from Smith College School for Social Work. She lives in Portland, ME.

Bibliography

  • The Sweet Relief of Missing Children: a Novel (2011)

Bakewell, Elizabeth ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Linguistic anthropologist and author Liza Bakewell lives on the coast of Maine. She graduated from Sarah Lawrence College with a B.A. in performing arts and anthropology (1979) and earned a Ph.D. in anthropology from Brown University (1991). She has been a professor at Brown since 1992 and directs The Mesolore Project, a research and educational software project on Mesoamerican writing systems, manuscripts, and history, from both the pre- and post-Corts periods. In addition, she has taught courses at Bowdoin College and Colgate University

Bibliography

  • Madre: Perilous Journeys with Spanish Noun (2011)

Conley, Susan (1967 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

After living in Beijing, China for two years, novelist Susan Conley and her family returned to Portland, ME. She is co-founder and former executive directory of the Telling Room, a writers' workshop and literary hub for the region. She was an associate editor at Ploughshares and has led creative writing seminars at Emerson College in Boston. Her work has been published in The New York Times Magazine, as well as The Paris Review, Harvard Review, Ploughshares and other literary magazines. She taught creative writing and literature at several colleges including Emerson College, Simmons College, The University of New England and within Harvard's Teachers as Writers Program. Susan graduated from Middlebury College and went on to get her M.F.A. in poetry from San Diego State University. Shes received two MacDowell Colony fellowships for her work, as well as a Breadloaf Writers fellowship and a Massachusetts Arts Council Grant.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Foremost Good Fortune (2011)
  • Paris was the Place (2013)
  • Elsey Come Home (2018)
  • Landslide (2021)

Selected Links

Wright, Virginia (1958 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Born and raised in Belfast, ME, children's author Virginia Wright began her writing career at an early age in a diary given as a gift by her mother. After graduation from high school in 1976, she took coursework in journalism and writing. Later, as a mother and homemaker, her writings were published in local publications and newspapers. A military family, the Wrights have lived in countries all over the world and in seven different states. Working in a day care in Mississippi influenced her decision to try writing books for children.

Bibliography

  • Buzzzzzzzz What Honeybees Do (2010)
  • Crying Bear (2010)
  • The Prince and the Dragon (2010)
  • The Princess and the Castle (2010)

Caldwell, Erskine (1903 - 1987)

Genre: General Fiction

Novelist and short story writer Erskine Caldwell was born in Georgia and grew up all over the South. He lived, for a time, in Maine in the 1930's where he and his wife managed a book store. After high school, he attended Erskine College, an A.R.P. school in South Carolina, and the University of Virginia, among other institutions. He never received a degree, but at the University of Virginia a professor encouraged him to be a writer.

Selected Bibliography

  • Tobacco Road (1932)
  • God's Little acre (1933)
  • Kneel to the Rising Sun (1935)
  • Have You Seen Their Faces (with Margaret Bourke-White)(1937)

Selected Links

Cariani, John (1969 - )

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film

Actor and playwright John Cariani was born and raised in Presque Isle, ME. After graduation from Presque Isle High, he studied at Amherst where he received his B.A. in History. He then studied acting and directing at StageWest in Springfield, MA. He has acted on television and on Broadway and wrote his first play which was named one of the best plays on 2004-2005 and was produced off Broadway in 2006.

Bibliography

  • Almost, Maine (2004)

Connolly, John (1968 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Author John Connolly was born and raised in Dublin, Ireland in 1968 and splits his time between there and Maine. He studied English in Trinity College, Dublin and journalism at Dublin City University, subsequently spending five years working as a freelance journalist for The Irish Times newspaper, to which he continues to contribute. His novels feature PI Charlie Parker and are usually set in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Every Dead Thing (1999)
  • Dark Hollow: A Novel (2001)
  • The Killing Kind (2002)
  • The White Road: A Thriller (2003)
  • Bad Men: A Thriller (2004)
  • Nocturnes (2005)
  • The Black Angel: A Thriller (2005)
  • Book of Lost Things (2006)
  • The Unquiet (2007)
  • The Reapers (2008)
  • The Lovers (2009)
  • The Whisperers: A Charlie Parker Thriller (2010)
  • The Wrath of Angels: A Charlie Parker Thriller (2013)

DeWolfe, Elizabeth ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Dr. Elizabeth A. DeWolfe is a Department Chair and professor of history in the Department of History at the University of New England in Biddeford, ME. She received her AB in Social Science from Colgate University, her MA in Anthropology from the State University of NY, Albany and her Ph.D.in American and New England Studies from Boston University.

Selected Bibliography

  • Such News of the Land: U.S. Women Nature Writers (with Thomas S. Edwards) (2000)
  • Shaking the Faith: Women, Family and Mary Marshall Dyer's Anti-Shaker Campaign, 1815-1867 (2002)
  • The Murder of Mary Bean and other Stories 92007)
  • Domestic Broils: Shakers, Marriage and the Narratives of Mary and Joseph Dyer (2010)

Dickson, Margaret (1946(?) - 2011)

Genre: General Fiction

Margaret Dickson was born and raised in Lewiston, ME. She graduated from Bates College in 1968 and attended graduate school at the University of Maine (Orono) and the University of New Hampshire where she received a Ford Foundation fellowship.

Bibliography

  • Octavia's Hill (1983)
  • Maddy's Song (1985)
  • Cliff Walk (1987)

Fendler, Donn (1927 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Maine "adopted son" Donn Fendler was born in Rye, NY in 1927. He is known as the boy who was lost on Mt. Katahdin for nine days in 1939 and survived. He summers in Newport, ME.

Bibliography

  • Donn Fendler: Lost on a Mountain in Maine: a Brave Boy's True Story of His Nine-day Adventure Alone in the Mount Katahdin Wilderness (as told to Joseph B Egan) (1939)

Hanna, Thomas (1927 - 2008)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Thomas L. Hanna was a longtime resident of Bath, Maine. Raised in the village of Five Islands on Georgetown Island in mid-coast Maine, he left home at seventeen to join the U.S. Navy during World War II, and eventually made the Navy his career. He retired as a senior chief operations specialist after twenty years service, and began a second career as a value engineer at Bath Iron Works. He retired in 1988 after twenty-two years. Then, using writing skills he had honed in the Navy and at BIW, he began writing for publication. His articles have appeared in Down East, Reminisce and Good Old Days.

Bibliography

  • Shoutin' into the Fog: Growing up on Maine's Ragged Edge (2006)

Hall, Lawrence (1915 - 1993)

Genre:

Lawrence Sargent Hall was born in Haverhill, Massachusetts. He taught at Deerfield Academy in Deerfield, Massachusetts (1936-38), received his Ph.D from Yale University (1941), taught at Ohio University in Athens (1941-42), at Yale (1946), and was a visiting professor at Columbia University (1956), before becoming professor of English at Bowdoin (1946-67), where he retired as Henry Leland Chapman Professor in 1986.

In addition to his academic career, Hall was appointed to the Governor's Council on the Arts & Culture in Maine (1964), served on the Maine State Commission on the Arts & Humanities (1965-68), was director of Maine Citizen's Association for Cooperative Planning (1966-69), and consultant for the Family Practice Residency Institute in Augusta (1973), developing a humanistic curriculum in medical education. He served to the rank of lieutenant commander in the U.S. Naval Reserve (1942-46), first teaching for a year at the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., and then serving on sea duty until the war ended. He was also director of a censorship intelligence unit of the Office of Strategic Services (1942).

Hall wrote the short story "The Ledge" (1959), which was awarded first place in the O. Henry Prize Collection in 1960, and has appeared in more than thirty anthologies. He was a contributor to Down East, Hudson Review, North American Review, The Reporter, Shakespeare Quarterly, and The Skipper.

Bibliography

  • Hawthorne: Critic of Society (1944)
  • Stowaway: A novel (1961)
  • How Thinking is Written, an Analytic Approach to Writing (1963)
  • A Grammar of Literary Criticism; Essays in Definition of Vocabulary, Concepts, and Aims (1965)
  • Seeing and Describing; Selected Descriptive Writing (1966)

Lowry, Lois (1937 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Lois Lowry was a military "brat" and a military wife, the result being that she was born in Hawaii and has lived in different places all over the world. She lives in Cambridge, MA and in Maine. She attended Brown University and received her degree from the University of Southern Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Summer to Die (1977)
  • Here in Kennebunkport (1978)
  • Find a Stranger, Say Goodbye (1978)
  • Stay! Keeper's Story (1997)
  • Looking Back: A Book of Memories (1998)
  • A Letter from the Snow (1999)
  • The Silent Boy (2003)
  • Messenger (2004)
  • Gossamer (2006)
  • Gooney, The Fabulous (2007)
  • The Willoughbys (2008)
  • Gooney Bird is so Absurd (2009)
  • Crow Call (2009)
  • The Birthday Ball (2010)
  • Like the Willow Tree: the Eiary of Lydia Amelia Pierce (2011)
  • Son (2012)
  • Gooney Bird and All Her Charms (2013)
  • Find a Stranger, Say Goodbye (2017)
  • On the Horizon (2020) illustrated by Kenard Pak
  • The Willoughbys Return (2020)

Crane, Donald ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet Donald Crane says of himself: "I have been at one time or another a farmer, newspaper reporter, advertising copywriter and public relations man." He lives in Milbridge, ME.

Bibliography

  • Report from Schoodic Head (1996)
  • Down the Bay (1998)
  • Down East (2008)

Related Websites

Doiron, Paul ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Paul Doiron is an award-winning journalist and the editor in chief of Down East: The Magazine of Maine, Down East Books, and DownEast.com. A native of Maine, he attended Yale University, where he graduated with a degree in English and he holds an MFA in creative writing from Emerson College. Paul is a Registered Maine Guide specializing in fly fishing and outdoor recreation and lives on a trout stream in coastal Maine with his wife. Doiron's fiction includes the Mike Bowditch series of crime novels, including The Poacher's Son, which won the the Barry Award and the Strand Critics Award for Best First Novel and was nominated for an Edgar Award, an Anthony Award, a Macavity Award, and a Thriller Award for Best First Novel, and the Maine Literary Award for "Best Fiction of 2010." PopMatters named it to its Best Fiction of 2010 list.

Bibliography

  • The Poacher's Son (2010)(Edgar and Barry award nominee)
  • Trespasser (June 2011)
  • Bad Little Falls (2012)
  • Massacre Pond (2013)
  • Bone Orchard (2014)
  • Precipice (2015)
  • Widowmaker (2016)
  • Knife Creek (2017)
  • Stay Hidden (2018)
  • Almost Midnight (2019)
  • One Last Lie (2020)

Lunt, Dean ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Dean Lawrence Lunt was born and raised in Frenchboro, ME. He received his degree in business and journalism from Syracuse University. He worked for many years as a reporter at several daily newspapers in the New England area, including the Portland Press Herald. He continues to live in Maine and runs the Islandport Press.

Bibliography

  • Hauling by Hand: the Life and Times of a Maine Island (1999)
  • Here for Generations: the Story of a Maine Bank and its City (2002)

Related Links

Richards, David (1962 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

David Richards is Assistant Director of the Northwood University Margaret Chase Smith Library in Skowhegan, Maine. David served as executive secretary of the Androscoggin Historical Society in Auburn, Maine, and curator of collections at the United Society of Shakers in New Gloucester, Maine. David earned his B.A. in History from Bates College in Lewiston, Maine, his M.A. in New England Studies from the University of Southern Maine, and his Ph.D. in History from the University of New Hampshire.

Selected Bibliography

  • In time & eternity : Maine Shakers in the industrial age, 1872-1918 (1986)
  • Poland Spring: A Tale of the Gilded Age (2005)

Related Links

Scott, Kathy (1954 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Author Kathy Scott was born and raised in Michigan and now divides her time between there and Maine. She is a great lover of nature and her books reflect that. From the Alder Creek Publishing website: Growing up on a family farm in Northern Michigan, Kathy Scott, early in life, gained an appreciation for all things natural. She carried this love of nature with her when she transplanted to Maine. There, at the edge of the Great North Woods, she and husband David Van Burgel have chosen to live close to nature, sharing their chain of ponds with moose, mink and beaver. Kat's passion to understand the natural world intertwines with David's dedication to handcrafting fine split bamboo fly rods; theirs is a lifelong immersion in the out-of-doors and the deep meaning of friendship. When not in Maine or Michigan, they are most likely to be found with their dog Kodiak poking about wild places.

Bibliography

  • Moose In The Water, Bamboo On The Bench: A Journal And A Journey (2000)
  • Headwaters Fall As Snow (2003)
  • Changing Planes (2008)
  • Brook Trout Forest (2011)

Watson, Jan (1972 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Jan Elizabeth Watson is a lifelong resident of Maine, raised in Augusta, a former resident of Portland currently living and teaching in Auburn. She received her MFA from Columbia University and has worked extensively as an editor, copywriter, and adjunct professor of creative writing.

Bibliography

  • Asta in the Wings (2009)
  • What Has Become of You (2014)

Buker, Russell (1939 - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet Russell Buker's family came from Weld, ME but followed the work to Massachusetts where he was born. He graduated from Warren High School in Warren, MA then moved back to Maine. He received his B.A. in English Lit from UNH in 1962. He has lived in York, Ogunquit, Kennebunkport, Nova Scotia and Eastport, where he taught for ten years. He retired to Alexander, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Noh: Poems by Russell Buker (2006)

Bass, Carol ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Carol Bass is an artist and interior designer who was raised in South Carolina and lives in Yarmouth, ME. In 1988, she co-founded Maine Cottage Furniture, which at one time boasted 200 stores across the United States. Her work has been featured in Metropolitan Home, Country Home, Redbook, Country Living, In Style, Coastal Living, Better Homes and Gardens, Home, House and Garden, and Cottage Living.

Bibliography

  • The Cottage Book : Living Simple And Easy (2003)
  • Maine Living (2004)
  • Color Your Home (2005)

Baxter, James (1831 - 1921)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

James Phinney Baxter was born in Gorham, Maine, but lived in Portland from 1840. He attended Master Jackson's School until 1844, and then Lynn Academy until 1848. He then went to Boston to work in a law office, but returned to Portland due to poor health. He worked in the dry goods importing and canning and packing industries, where he made his fortune. He was elected mayor of Portland for six years, and was the father of future Maine governor Percival Procter Baxter. He was a philanthropist (donating Baxter Memorial Library to Gorham, ME, for example) and, in his retirement years, became a scholar of Maine and New England history.

Selected Bibliography

  • George Cleeve Of Casco Bay, 1630-1667: With Collateral Documents (1885)
  • Sir Ferdinando Gorges And His Province Of Maine (1890)
  • Christopher Levett, Of York : The Pioneer Colonist In Casco Bay (1893)
  • Documentary History Of The State Of Maine, Containing The Baxter Manuscripts (1910)

Selected Resources

Beale, William ( - 1966)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction

Will Beale was born and raised in Eastport, ME. He was an accomplished violinist who traveled and did concert work for many years. He then tried his hand at the fish canning industry, attempting to package fish products in glass, with moderate success. He also had a successful insurance and real estate business. He wrote children's books and short stories which were published in Everybody's American and Good Housekeeping, some of his westerns were made into films.

Selected Bibliography

  • Frontier Of The Deep: A Tale Of The Great Northeast (1925)
  • Who Eat Up My People? (1949)
  • Binky (1954)
  • Seapiece: The Story of a Maine Boy (1966)

Selected Resources

Bean, Leon (1872 - 1966)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Leon Leonwood Bean, best known as the retailer and entrepreneur L. L. Bean, was also an author. Born in Greenwood, ME., he grew up in South Paris and had very little formal education.

Bibliography

  • Hunting, Fishing and Camping (1942)
  • My Story: the Autobiography of a Down-East Merchant (1960)

Selected Resources

Berry, Katherine (1877 - 1972?)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Katherine Fiske Berry was born in Bath, ME and raised in Japan and Germany. Her early education was provided by her parents and private tutors in Japan. She then spent time in Germany, and returned to the U.S. in 1893. She graduated high school from Burnham School in Northampton and entered Smith College in 1898 where she graduated with an A. B. in 1902. She then moved to Worcester MA with her parents.

Bibliography

  • A Pioneer Doctor In Old Japan: The Story Of John C. Berry, M. D. (1940)
  • Camping Characters On Casco Bay (1954)
  • Katie-San: From Maine Pastures To Japan Shores (1962)

Bourne, Russell ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Russell Bourne is a writer and publishing consultant who has worked for American Heritage, Hearst Books, Smithsonian Books, and the National Geographic Book Service. He writes in the field of American history and divides his time between Ithaca, New York, and Castine, Maine.

Bibliography

  • The View from Front Street: Travels Through New England's Historic Fishing Communities (1989)
  • The Red King's Rebellion : Racial Politics In New England, 1675-1678 (1990)
  • Floating West : The Erie And Other American Canals (1992)
  • Rivers Of America : Birthplaces Of Culture, Commerce, And Community (1998)
  • Gods Of War, Gods Of Peace : How The Meeting Of Native And Colonial Religions Shaped Early America (2002)

Murphy, Kevin ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Kevin Murphy is "a life-long part-time resident of Maine." He says: I am a life-long part-time resident of Maine. My grandfather summered in Biddeford Pool from around 1910 on and later took my mother and grandmother to Ogunquit every summer. He and my grandmother retired to Ogunquit in the 1970s. I went to Cape Neddick (York) every summer growing up and started my professional life in art and architectural history at the Brick Store Museum in Kennebunk in 1981. From that time I have had an ongoing professional and personal connection to Maine. I have worked for the Maine Humanities Council, the Maine Historic Preservation Commission, the Museums of Old York, the York Institute Museum, and have been on an advisory council at the Portland Museum of Art. I spent a couple of different years in Maine, and have always spent summers there -- for thirteen years my family and I have had a home in Brooksville, Maine, near Blue Hill. He is professor of art history at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York.

Selected Bibliography

  • Memory And Modernity : Viollet-Le-Duc At V?zelay (2000)
  • Colonial Revival Maine (2004)
  • The American Townhouse (2005)
  • Jonathan Fisher Of Blue Hill, Maine : Commerce, Culture, And Community On The Eastern Frontier (2010)

Coleman, Melissa ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Melissa Coleman is a freelance writer and memoirist who lives in Freeport, ME. She is a columnist for Maine and Maine Home and Design magazines and serves on the board of The Telling Room, a writing center for children located in Portland.

Bibliography

  • This Life Is in Your Hands: One Dream, Sixty Acres, and a Family Undone (2011)

Gup, Ted ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Award-winning journalist and author Ted Gup lives in Boston, MA and Bucksport, ME. He received his BA from Brandeis University and his JD from Case Western Reserve University School of Law. He was a Fulbright Scholar and has won the Gerald Loeb Award, the Worth Bingham Prize for investigative journalism, the George Polk Award for foreign reporting, and was a Pulitzer finalist, among other awards. He is a former staff writer for the Washington Post and Time Magazine. Currently, he is the chair of the journalism department at Emerson College.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Book of Honor: Secret Lives and Deaths of CIA Operatives (2001)

  • Nation of Secrets: The Threat to Democracy and the American Way of Life (2007)

  • A Secret Gift: How One Man's Kindness--and a Trove of Letters--Revealed the Hidden History of the Great Depression (2010)

Jenkins, Jessica ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Jessica Kerwin Jenkins began her career in New York writing for Women's Wear Daily and for W magazine, later becoming the magazine's European editor in Paris. She returned to New York, then she and her soon-to-be-husband decided to "simplify their lives" and bought a "fixer-upper" on the Blue Hill peninsula in Maine. She continues to write for Vogue as well as a blog.

Bibliography

  • Encyclopedia of the Exquisite : an Anecdotal History of Elegant Delights (2010)

Brett, Jeannie ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Illustrator and author Jeannie Brett grew up in Hingham, MA and lives in York Harbor, ME. She attended the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and Minneapolis College of Art & Design in Minnesota and became a freelance illustrator, doing educational illustration and commercial illustration for local ad agencies. She then began illustrating childrens books.

Bibliography

Illustrator

  • L Is For Lobster: A Maine Alphabet written by Cynthia Furlong Reynolds (2001)
  • M is for Mayflower: a Massachusetts Alphabet written by Margot Theis Raven (2002)
  • Fishing For Numbers: A Maine Number Book written by Cynthia Furlong Reynolds (2005)
  • One If By Land: A Massachusetts Number Book written by Heidi E.Y. Stemple (2006)

Illustrator/Author

  • Little Maine (2010)

Briant, Ed ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Author, illustrator and teacher Ed Briant divides his time between Savannah, GA and Portland, ME. He received his MFA in Creative Writing for Children and Young Adults in July 2006 and His BA (hons) in Graphic Design from Saint martins School of Art in 1980. He has taught illustration at a variety of institutions including Middlesex Polytechnic, Hull School of Art, Savannah College of Art and Design and the Maine College of Art.

Selected Bibliography

Author/Illustrator

  • Seven Stories (2005)
  • A Day at the Beach (2006)
  • Don't Look Now (2008)
  • If You Lived Here You'd Be Home By Now (2009)

Illustrator

  • Paper Parade (2004)
  • Gizmo (2007)

Magoon, Scott ( - )

Genre: Illustrator

Children's book illustrator Scott Magoon was raised in Cornville, ME and lives in Boston, MA where he is an art director. He taught himself to draw and has illustrated several books for children.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ugly Fish written by Kara LaReau (2006)
  • Rabbit & Squirrel: A Tale Of War & Peas written by Kara LaReau (2008)
  • Otto Grows Down written by Michael Sussman (2009)
  • Spoon written by Amy Krouse Rosenthal (2009)
  • Mostly Monsterly Tammi Sauer (2010)

Pierson, Duane (1937 - )

Genre: Poetry

Duane Robert Pierson was born and raised in Newton, NJ where his early schooling was in a one-room schoolhouse. He has been awarded a Bachelor of Arts in biology and history from the University of Alabama, and a Master of Science and Doctor of Philosophy from Cornell University. He has taught elementary school, high school, has been a college professor, and has taught English, creative writing, poetry, history, science, and ethics. He has served as a corporate chief executive officer, has been a management and leadership consultant and a public speaker. He has also founded several organizations within the environmental/conservation field, as well as having been an infantry officer, athlete, art gallery owner, stonemason, farmer, and photographer. Over the years he has written and published extensively including several volumes of poetry. He has lived in Maine since 1989, in Portland since 1995.

Selected Bibliography

  • Walking Wicket, The Bookstore Dog: Poems (2005)
  • On Reviving A Lost Revolution: Poetry (2006)
  • Ode to Freida (2006)
  • When Young Men Die: Poetry of War (2007)
  • Frogs, Dogs, And Eclogues: Poetry, Rural And Pastoral (2007)
  • Field Of Wildflowers With Girl: Poetry Of Love, Romance And Related Confusion (2008)
  • When My Feet Quit Dancing: Poetry On The Personal Side (2008)
  • The Indictment: Poetry Most Critical (2008)

Calder, Nigel (1948 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Marine writer and conservationist Nigel Calder was born and raised in Newbury, England. He lives in Alna, ME. He is an advocate for saving the small coastal towns of Maine from urban sprawl.

Selected Bibliography

  • Boatowner's Mechanical and Electrical Manual: How to Maintain, Repair, and Improve Your Boat's Essential Systems (1996)
  • Nigel Calder's Cruising Handbook : A Compendium For Coastal And Offshore Sailors (2001)
  • How To Read A Nautical Chart : A Complete Guide To The Symbols, Abbreviations, And Data Displayed On Nautical Charts (2003)

Calvert, Mary (1904 - 2000)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Mary R. Calvert was born in Madison, ME and graduated from Madison High School. She married French ex-patriate and WWI veteran Francis Calvert in 1924 and they travelled all over the United States, first while he worked for General Electric, then as they founded several of their own companies. She learned photography to take photos of their products and continued it as a hobby, specializing in nature photography, winning several awards. She published three books of her collections of photographs. From photographing the Arnold Expedition Re-enactment in 1975 and the last of the Kennebec River log drive in 1976, she became interested in the history of Maine and started writing about it. She was a member of the Photographic Society of America, past president of the Woman's Photography Society of Cleveland, a member of the National League of American Penwomen, the Lincoln County Camera Club, the New England Wildflower Society, the Maine Society of Mayflower Descendants and the DAR, Pemaquid Chapter, and a life member of the Arnold Expedition Historical Society. She received the Deborah Morton Award at the 1983 commencement exercises at Westbrook College for her photography and writing. At the dedication of the Westbrook College Library, the Maine Women in History Room was named in her honor and a collection of her books and photographs is housed in the room named after her in the Katz Library at the University of Maine, Augusta.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Captured in Color (1980)
  • Nature Trails Captured in Color (1982)
  • Dawn over the Kennebec (1983)
  • The Kennebec Wilderness Awakens (1986)
  • Children (1988)
  • Black Robe on the Kennebec (1991)
  • The First Maine Cavalry (1997)

Canham, Erwin (1904 - 1982)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Erwin D. Canham was born in Auburn, ME. His family were Christian Scientists and his father was an agricultural editor at the Lewiston Sun Journal and Erwin later served as editor of the Christian Science Monitor for over 30 years. He graduated from Bates College in 1925 and he earned a B.A. and M.A. from Oxford in 1929 which he attended as a Rhodes Scholar. He became managing editor at the Monitor in 1942, editor in 1945 and editor in chief in 1964. He served as a delegate to the United Nations Geneva conference on freedom of information in 1949 and chairman of the U.S. Advisory Commission on Information for the U.S. Information Agency, was a director of the John Hancock Mutual Life Insurance Company and the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, and a trustee of Wellesley College, Bates College, Boston Public Library and the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. After his retirement from the Monitor, he and his wife split their time between Concord, MA and Saipan where he was a resident commissioner of the Northern Mariana islands. He died at the age of 77 on Guam.

Selected Bibliography

  • Awakening: The World At Mid-Century (1951)
  • Commitment to Freedom : the Story of the Christian Science Monitor (1958)
  • Man's Great Future (1959)

Carroll, Warren (1932 - 2011)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Historian and author Warren Hasty Carroll was the son of Maine author Gladys Hasty Carroll. He received his B.A. in history from Bates College in 1953 and his M.A. and Ph.D. in history from Columbia University. He lived in Manassas, VA.

Selected Bibliography

  • Our Lady Of Guadalupe And The Conquest Of Darkness (1983)
  • 1917, Red Banners, White Mantle
  • The Founding Of Christendom (1985)
  • The Building Of Christendom (1987)
  • Isabel Of Spain: The Catholic Queen (1991)
  • The Guillotine And The Cross (1991)
  • The Glory Of Christendom (1993)
  • The Rise And Fall Of The Communist Revolution(1995)
  • The Last Crusade (1996)
  • The Cleaving Of Christendom (2000)

Carter, William ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Journalist and author W. Hodding Carter (IV) was raised in Greenville, MS and lives in Rockport ME. He is the son of President Carter's State Department spokesman, and the grandson of a Pulitzer Prize-winning Mississippi newspaper editor. He attended Kenyon College where he was an all-American swimmer and is a swimming coach here in Maine. He has written pieces for Esquire, M Magazine, Outside, and has had a regular column in Gourmet Magazine Online.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Viking Voyage: In Which An Unlikely Crew Of Adventurers Attempts An Epic Journey To The New World (2000)
  • An Illustrated Viking Voyage: Retracing Leif Eriksson's Journey In An Authentic Viking Knarr (2000)
  • Stolen Water : Saving The Everglades From Its Friends, Foes, And Florida (2004)
  • Flushed : How The Plumber Saved Civilization (2006)
  • Off the Deep End : the Probably Insane Idea that I Could Swim My Way Through a Midlife Crisis-and Qualify for the Olympics (2008)

Chadbourne, Ava (1875 - 1964)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Ava Harriet Chadbourne was born in Mattawamkeag, ME. She received her AB (1915) and MA (1918) from the University of Maine, and received a PhD. from Columbia University (1922). She was a professor of education at the University of Maine and retired as a full professor in 1942. Chadbourne Hall on the campus of the University of Maine is named in her honor.

Bibliography

  • The Beginnings of Education in Maine (1928)
  • Readings in the History of Education in Maine: a Collection of Sources and Readings Concerning the History of Maine and the Development of Educational Theory and Practice (1932)
  • A History Of Education In Maine: A Study Of A Section Of American Educational History (1936)
  • The Origin Of The Names Of The City And Towns In Hancock County, Maine (1951)
  • Maine Place Names And The Peopling Of Its Towns (1955)

Selected Resources

Chadbourne, Merle (1891 - 1968)

Genre: General Fiction

Author, carpenter and shoe worker Merle G. Chadbourne was born in Cambridge, ME and lived and died in Harmony, ME.

Bibliography

  • Timberland Tall Tales (1960)
  • Old Suke: A Legend Of West Athens, Maine (1965)
  • Stay Awake Stories (1966)

Chamberlain, Joshua (1828 - 1914)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Author, educator, governor and Civil War hero Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain was born in Brewer, ME and lived in Brunswick, ME. He graduated from Bowdoin College in 1852 and Bangor Theological Seminary in 1855, then returned to Bowdoin to teach. At the outbreak of the Civil War, he left Bowdoin to join the Army as a Lieut. Col. of the 20th Maine regiment. He received the Medal of Honor for actions taken at Little Round Top in the Battle of Gettysburg; was wounded 6 times; was promoted to Brigadier General; and received the Confederate surrender of arms on April 12, 1865. He later served as Maine's governor for 4 terms and as president of Bowdoin College.

Selected Bibliography

  • "Bayonet! Forward": my Civil War Reminiscences (1994)
  • The Passing of the Armies; an Account of the Final Campaign of the Army of the Potomac, Based Upon Personal Reminiscences of the Fifth Army Corps (1915)
  • Joshua L. Chamberlain: A Life in Letters: The Previously Unpublished Letters of a Great Leader of The Civil War (2012)

Selected Websites

Chandler, Anna (1890 - 1969)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Story-teller, educator and author Anna Curtis Chandler was born in Brunswick, ME. Her family moved to Massachusetts when she was a child. She received her B.A from Wellesley College (1909) and joined the photographic department of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City in 1910. She began telling illustrated stories in the lecture hall of the Museum in 1916 to 70,000+ elementary age children every year. She remained at the Museum in the Education Department until 1934, then taught literature at Hunter College.

Selected Bibliography

  • More Magic Pictures Of The Long Ago : Stories Of The People Of Many Lands (1919)
  • Pan the Piper and Other Marvelous Tales (1923)
  • A Voyage to Treasure Land (1929)
  • Story-Lives of Master Artists (1929)
  • Treasure Trails in Art (1937)
  • Famous Mothers and their Children (1938)

Selected Resources

Chase, Joseph (1878 - 1965)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Artist and author Joseph Cummings Chase was born and raised in Kents Hill, ME. He studied at the Pratt Institute and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and in Paris at the Julian Academy. He was best known as a portraitist, painted or "sketch portraits." Some of his subjects were Theodore Roosevelt, Warren G. Harding, General John J. Pershing. He also worked as a window designer for Saks Fifth Avenue.

Selected Bibliography

  • Drawing Made Easy (1919)
  • The Romance of an Art Career (1928)
  • My Friends Look Good to Me (1933)
  • My Friends Look Better Than Ever (1950)
  • Face Value: Autobiography of the Portrait Painter (1962)

Clark, Walter (1907 - 1971)

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

Novelist, short story writer and teacher Walter Van Tilburg Clark was born in North Anson, ME, but he grew up and went to school in Reno Nevada. He began his writing and teaching career in New York in 1933. One of his most famous books was The Ox Bow Incident which was made into an Academy Award nominated film starring Henry Fonda. He ended his career as writer-in-residence at his alma mater, the University of Nevada, in Reno and was the first writer inducted into the Nevada Writers Hall of Fame in 1988.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Ox Bow Incident (1942)
  • The City of Trembling Leaves (1945)
  • The Track of the Cat: A Novel (1949)
  • The Watchful Gods, and Other Stories (1950)

Coburn, Louise (1856 - 1949)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Botanist, poet, pioneer in Maine women's higher education, Louise Helen Coburn was born, raised and lived much of her life in Skowhegan, ME. She was a second generation attendee of Colby College, the second woman to ever graduate there, the first female trustee, and a founder of the sorority Sigma Kappa. She wrote science books and pamphlets, as well as poetry, and was the editor of the Maine Naturalist. She created the Skowhegan History House Museum which still exists as a museum and research center.

Selected Bibliography

  • Flora Of Birch Island In Attean Pond (1920)
  • The Passage Of The Arnold Expedition Through Skowhegan (1922)
  • Skowhegan On The Kennebec (1932)

Selected Websites

Coffin, Frank (1919 - 2009)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Legislator, judge and author Frank Morey Coffin was born in Lewiston, ME. He was educated in Lewiston public schools, graduated from Bates College in 1940, from Harvard Business School in 1943, and Harvard Law School in 1947. He served as an ensign, later promoted to lieutenant, in the U.S. Navy in the Pacific Theater from 1943-1946. After the war, he was admitted to the bar and commenced the practice of law in Lewiston, Maine. He was chairman of the Maine Democratic State committee 1954-1956 and elected as a Democrat to the Eighty-fifth and Eighty-sixth Congresses (January 3, 1957-January 3, 1961). He was the managing director of the Development Loan Fund until October 1961 when he became deputy administrator of the Agency for International Development and served until 1964 when he was appointed to serve as United States Representative to Development Assistance Committee of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Paris, France, 1964-1965. He was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, October 2, 1965, and served as chief judge of that court, 1972 to 1983, and assumed senior status, February 1, 1989. He was also chairman of the U.S. Judicial Conference Committee on the Judicial Branch, 1984-1990.

Selected Bibliography

  • Witness for AID (1964)
  • The Ways Of A Judge : Reflections From The Federal Appellate Bench (1980)
  • On Appeal : Courts, Lawyering, And Judging (1994)

Craig, Alisa ( - )

Genre: Mystery

Pseudonym for mystery writer Charlotte Macleod SEE ALSO: Charlotte MacLeod

Selected Bibliography

  • Murder Goes Mumming (1981)
  • A Dismal Thing to Do (1986)
  • The Grub and Stakers Spin a Yarn (1990)
  • The Wrong Rite (1992)
  • The Grub & Stakers House a Haunt (1993)

Curtis, Winterton (1875 - 1966)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Scientist and author Winterton Conway Curtis was born in Richmond, ME. He was chairman of the Department of Zoology at the University of Missouri and was an expert witness at the John Scopes evolution in schools trial in 1925, though he was never called to testify.

Selected Bibliography

  • Good Old Summer Times At The M.B.L. And Rhymes Of The Woods Hole Shores (1955)
  • Fundamentalism vs Evolution At Dayton, Tennessee: Abstracts From The Autobiographical Notes Of Winterton Conway Curtis 1956
  • A Yankee Boy On Oregon Trails : Abstracts From Autobiographical Notes Of Winterton C. Curtis (1956)
  • State Of Maine : Abstracts From The Autobiographical Notes Of Winterton C. Curtis (1956)

Dunnett, Kaitlyn (1947 - )

Genre: Mystery

Kaitlyn Dunnett is a pseudonym for author Kathy Lynn Emerson.

SEE ALSO: Kathy Lynn Emerson, Kaitlyn Gorton

Selected Bibliography

  • Kilt Dead (2007)
  • Scone Cold Dead (2009)
  • A Wee Christmas Homicide (2009)
  • The Corpse Wore Tartan (2010)
  • Scotched (2011)
  • Bagpipes, Brides and Homicides (2012)
  • Vampires, Bones and Treacle Scones (2013)
  • Ho-Ho Homicide (2014)
  • The Scottie Barked at Midnight (2015)
  • Kilt at the Highland Games (2016)
  • X Marks the Scot (2017)
  • Crime and Punctuation (2018)
  • Overkilt (2018)
  • Clause and Effect (2019)
  • A Fatal Fiction (2020)
  • A View to a Kilt (2020)

Gorton, Kaitlyn (1947 - )

Genre: Romance Novel

Kaitlyn Gorton is a pseudonym for author Kathy Lynn Emerson.

SEE ALSO: Kathy Lynn Emerson, Kate Emerson

Selected Bibliography

  • Cloud Castles (1989)
  • Hearth, Home and Hope (1995)
  • Separated Sisters

Emerson, Kate (1947 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Kate Emerson is a pseudonym for author Kathy Lynn Emerson.

SEE ALSO: Kathy Lynn Emerson,Kaitlyn Gorton.

Selected Bibliography

Secrets of the Tudor Court Series

  • The Pleasure Palace (2008)
  • Between Two Queens (2010)
  • By Royal Decree (2010)

Danforth, Mildred (1900 - 1980)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Author, librarian and teacher Mildred E. Danforth was born in Lebanon, ME and grew up in Berwick, ME. She graduated from Sanford High School, received her A.B. at the University of New Hampshire and her M.A. in Dramatic Art at the University of North Carolina and her Certificate in Library Science from the City Library in Springfield, MA. She taught a district school for one year in Lebanon, ME and worked at the Silas Bronson Library in Waterbury CT, taught at the Vocational School for Girls in Tullahoma TN, during the depression at Five Points House, a school for underprivileged boys at Pomona, NY, and was a WAC during World War II. She also taught at Thomas College in Waterville, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Quaker Pioneer: Laura Haviland, Superintendent Of The Underground (1961)
  • From Outer Space (1963)
  • Meditations of a Mainer: [Poems] (1972)

Selected Websites

Danforth, Mildred ( - 1985)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Author, librarian and teacher Mildred E. Danforth was born in Lebanon, ME and grew up in Berwick, ME. She graduated from Sanford High School, received her A.B. at the University of New Hampshire and her M.A. in Dramatic Art at the University of North Carolina and her Certificate in Library Science from the City Library in Springfield, MA. She taught a district school for one year in Lebanon, ME and worked at the Silas Bronson Library in Waterbury CT, taught at the Vocational School for Girls in Tullahoma TN, during the depression at Five Points House, a school for underprivileged boys at Pomona, NY, and was a WAC during World War II.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Quaker Pioneer: Laura Haviland, Superintendent Of The Underground (1961)
  • From Outer Space (1963)
  • Meditations of a Mainer: [Poems] (1972)

Davis, W(illiam) (1960 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

W. Sumner Davis was born in Waterville, ME. He received his B.A. in Psychology from the University of Maine, a masters in social psychology from Springfield College, a Master of Divinity from Bangor Theological Seminary and a Th.D. (Doctor of Theology) from Freedom Seminary in Washington, D.C. He is an educator, counselor and author. He is dyslexic and is a strong proponent of alternative education programs. Greatly influenced by Carl Sagan, he is an outspoken critic of the use of nuclear arms. He teaches undergraduate Astronomy at The H. J. Fowler Observatory for the University of Maine and is an Instructor of Medical Ethics at New England College's graduate program. He lives in New Hampshire.

Selected Bibliography

  • Losing Faith : A Quest For Truth And The Origins Of Life (2001)
  • Heretics : The Bloody History Of The Christian Church (2002)
  • Just Smoke And Mirrors : Religion, Fear And Superstition In Our Modern World (2003)

Day, Maurice (Jake) (1892 - 1983)

Genre: Illustrator

Artist, sculptor, photographer, naturalist, animator and illustrator Maurice E. (Jake) Day was born in Damariscotta, ME. He attended Lincoln Academy in Newcastle, ME where his artistic talent gained him notice. After he graduated, he attended the Massachusetts College of Art, then transferred to the school of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston where he graduated in 1915. He was one of the first animators who worked for Walt Disney, best known as the animator for Bambi. He also illustrated for The Atlantic Monthly, Vanity Fair and Life Magazine. He was an active outdoorsman hiking and tramping Mt. Katahdin before it was a state park or had any trails.

Selected Bibliography

Illustrator

  • Jane, Joseph & John : Their Book Of Verses By Ralph Bergengren (1918)
  • The Land Of The Great Out-Of-Doors By Robert Livingston (1920)
  • The Animal Etiquette Book By Helen Cowles Le Cron (1926)
  • The New Path To Reading. Primer By Anna Dorothea Cordts (1929)
  • Beasties By Elsa Dresbach (1951)
  • New England's Last Wilderness : The Valley Of The Wassataquoick By Edmund Ware Smith (1956)
  • Maine : A Literary Chronicle Edited, With Commentaries, By W. Storrs Lee (1968)

Clarke, Brock ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Novelist Brock Clarke teaches creative writing at Bowdoin College.

Selected Bibliography

  • Exley: a Novel (2010)
  • The Price of the Haircut: Stories (2018)
  • Who Are You Calvin Bledsoe: A Novel (2019)

Selected Resources

Delabarre, Edmund (1863 - 1945)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Psychologist, educator, archaeologist and author Edmund Burke Delabarre was born in Dover, ME. He received his baccalaureate degree in 1886 from Amherst college, studied at the University of Berlin in 1887-88, Harvard University 1888-90 where he received his Master of Arts degree, then he studied at the University of Freiburg and received his doctorate in Philosophy in 1891. He was appointed Associate Professof of Psychology at Brown University but took a leave of absence to study at the Sorbonne. He was promoted to Professor of Psychology in 1896 and he retired in 1932. He was known, especially in Portugal, for his study and interpretation of the inscriptions on Dighton Rock, located on the Taunton River in Massachusetts. He attributed them to Miguel Corte-Real, a Portuguese navigator and explorer who disappeared in 1502.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Relation Of Mental Content To Nervous Activity (1901)
  • Report Of The Brown-Harvard Expedition To Nachvak, Labrador In The Year 1900 (1902)
  • Influence Of Surrounding Objects On The Apparent Direction Of A Line (1906?)
  • Collected Papers On The Inscribed Rocks Of Narragansett Bay (1925)
  • Dighton Rock; A Study Of The Written Rocks Of New England (1928)

Demaris, Ovid (1919 - 1998)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Journalist and author Ovid Demaris was a native of Biddeford, ME. He was a United Press correspondent and a newspaper reporter as well as the author of several books, most of which were historical or biographical and about "gangsters" or persons connected with the Mafia. He received his A.B from the College of Idaho in 1948, his law degree from Syracuse University Law School and his M.S. from Boston University in 1950.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Green Felt Jungle: Truth About Las Vegas (1963)
  • Captive City: Chicago in Chains (1969)
  • America the Violent (1970)
  • Poso Del Mundo: Inside the Mexican-American Border, From Tijuana to Matamoros (1970)
  • Dirty Business: The Corporate-Political Money-Power Game (1974)
  • The Director: An Oral Biography of J. Edgar Hoover (1975)
  • Brothers in Blood: The International Terrorist Network (1977)
  • The Last Mafioso: The Treacherous World of Jimmy Fratianno (1980)
  • The Vegas Legacy (1983)
  • Ricochet (1988)

Dennison, George (1925 - 1987)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Short Stories

George Dennison was raised in Pittsburgh, PA. He served in the Navy during WWII, attended the New School for Social Research, and took graduate courses at New York University. He taught at several different grade levels, elementary through high school. He also trained with Paul Goodman at the New York Institute for Gestalt Therapy and worked with traumatized children as a lay therapist and teacher. He joined the First Street School in 1964 and based his best-selling book The Lives of Children on his experiences there. He moved to Temple, ME to raise his family and died there in 1987.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Lives Of Children; The Story Of The First Street School (1969)
  • Luisa Domic: A Novel (1985)
  • A Tale of Pierrot and Other Stories (1987)

DeVito, Pam ( - )

Genre: Illustrator

Illustrator Pam DeVito lives in East Orland, ME.

Selected Bibliography

Illustrator

  • The Little Ones By Jane D. Weinberger (1987)
  • The First Snowflake Of Winter By Louise Phillips (1987)
  • The Island Merry-Go-Round by Ruth Sargent (1988)
  • Christmas Tales by Marilis Hornidge (1988)
  • Dinni, the Dinosaur by Audrey Stone (1988)
  • Home is Best by Sylvia White (1988)
  • Dragomir by Alfred Friendly (1988)
  • Sweet Dreams, Sarah (1989)
  • Shopping at the Ani-mall by Gloria S. Bullock and Jane Bullock (1991)
  • Gertrude, a Goose on the Loose by Jean T. Fredeking (1991)
  • The Other Side of the Desk by Sandra K. Bunt (1992)
  • High Island Treasure by George E. Gjelfriend (1992)
  • Cory the Cormorant by Jane Weinberger (1992)
  • The Tunnel Beneath the Sea by Ruth Sargent (1993)
  • Mrs. Witherspoon's Eagles by Jane Weinberger (1994)
  • Stories on Rocks by Zilpha M. Booth (1994)
  • Miss Purdy's Problem by Mary Chesley (1994)
  • Jarad's Special Visitor by Dale Shanning Hartman (1994)
  • Mrs. Funnywinkle by Susan Osinski Morelli (1994)
  • Janice and Juanita by Beverly Mach Geller (1995)
  • A Home for Sita by Julie T. Grab (1995)
  • The First Tulip of Spring by Louise Phillips (1995)
  • The Diner on the Wall by Tom Soybel (1996)
  • Finding a Friend by Zilpha M. Booth (1996)
  • The First Sunbeam of Summer by Louise Phillips (1996)
  • The First Leaf of Fall by Louise Phillips (1996)
  • Look at the Night by Michael O'Hearn and Lucy Oliveri-O'Hearn (1996)
  • We are the Children of the Forest by Louise Phillips (1997)
  • Oliver Bean Visits the Queen by Joy Bacon (1998)
  • We'll Paint the Octopus Red by Stephanie Stuve-Bodeen (1998)
  • Canned Plums and Other Vicissitudes of Life: Being the Reminiscences of Several Old Women Who Really Had Ought to Know Better than to Commit Anything to Print by Jane Weinberger (1999)

Author/Illustrator

  • Lydia and the Purple Paint (1989)

Dexter, Elisabeth (1887 - 1972)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Scholar, educator, WWII relief-worker Elisabeth Williams Anthony Dexter was born in Bangor, ME. She received her degree in Philosophy from Bates College in 1908, her Master's in Sociology from Columbia University, and here doctorate in history from Clark University in 1927. She then became a member of the faculty of Skidmore College and a part-time tutor at Radcliffe. In 1941, she and her husband moved to Lisbon, Portugal. Lisbon was neutral during WWII and thus a haven for refugees. She worked with refugee assistance and by 1944 was European Directory of the Unitarian Service Committee and oversaw a relief program to assist Jewish refugees stranded in Portugal awaiting emigration. In 1942, she began working for the OSS to help pass information and recruit refugees to help with various missions.

Selected Bibliography

  • Colonial Women of Affairs; a Study of Women in Business and the Professions in America Before 1776 (1924)
  • The Making of a Nation with Harry Elmer Barnes and Mabel Gregory Walker (1929)

Zorach, William (1889 - 1996)

Genre: General Fiction

Artist and Sculpture William Zorach was a graduate of Bates College and a resident of Bath. In addition to his art, Zorach wrote an autobiography and a textbook on sculpture. He was the father of Maine Writer Dahlov Ipcar. He died in Bath, Maine November 15, 1966.

Selected Bibliography

  • Zorach Explains Sculpture: What It Means and How It Is Made (1960)
  • Art Is My Life: the Autobiography of William Zorach 1967

Selected Bibliography

Zimmerman, Julie (1946 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Native Mainer Julie Zimmerman is and alumnus of Swarthmore College ('68). She is a poet and former publisher who is one of the founders and creative forces behind The College Guild, a correspondence school for incarcerated individuals.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Almanac of Back Pain Treatments (1991)
  • Chronic Back Pain: Moving On (1991)
  • The Diagnosis and Misdiagnosis of Back Pain (1991)
  • Wishing on Daruma (1992)
  • Untidy Candles: An Anthology of Contemporary Maine Poets (editor) (1995)

Zillman, Donald (1944 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Donald N. Zillman is the President, University of Maine at Presque Isle. As a legal scholar and professor he has co-authored a number of texts.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Tort Law (with Simmons and Gregory, 1994 and regular updates)
  • Energy Security (with Barton, Redgwell, and Ronne 2004)
  • Beyond the Carbon Economy (with Redgwell, Omorogbe, and Bararera-Hernandez 2008)
  • Strategic Legal Writing (with Roth 2008)

Beiser, Karl (1949 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Karl Beiser was born in Belfast and grew up in Northport, ME. He attended Belfast High School, then Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, the University of Maine (BA, 1971), and the University of Rhode Island (MLS, 1973). He has worked as a librarian and library director in Maine; as coordinator of programs bringing computers into Maine libraries; and now as a consultant in the field of computers in libraries.

Selected Bibliography

  • 25 Ski Tours in Maine (1979)
  • Essential Guide To DBASE III+ In Libraries (1987)
  • The Operating System: PC-DOS (1989)
  • Essential Guide To DBase IV In Libraries (1991)
  • DOS 5.0 For Libraries (1992)

Zielinski, Gregory ( - )

Genre: Mystery, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Former university professor and Maine State Climatologist, Gregory Zielinski writes about the weather and soon, murder mysteries set in Bar Harbor, ME. He lives in Glenburn, ME. He was born in Reading, PA and received his B.S. from Pennsylvania State University, his M.S. from Idaho State University and a Ph.D. from the University of Massachusetts. He has held professorships at several universities, the latest being at the University of Maine. His teaching and research was in the field of climatology and he has published in over 60 professional journals. He retired from teaching and climatology in 2008 to concentrate on writing novels and other non-fiction.

Selected Bibliography

  • New England Weather, New England Climate (2003)
  • Conditions May Vary: A Guide to Maine Weather (2009)

Selected Bibliography

  • New England Weather, New England Climate (2003)
  • Conditions May Vary: A Guide to Maine Weather (2009)

Selected Resources

Zarucchi, Roy ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Roy Zarucchi is a poet living in Downeast Maine. Born in California, he served as an Air Force Officer during the Viet Nam War. With his wife, poet Carolyn Page, he edits the literary arts magazine Potato Eyes.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sparse Rain (1990)
  • Gunners Moon (1996)
  • The Last Dago Cowboy: Mendocino County Poems (2009)

Zahares, Wade ( - )

Genre: Illustrator

Painter and illustrator Wade Zahares lives in West Kennebunk Maine. He is a graduate of the Maryland Institute, College of Art in Baltimore.

Selected Bibliography

Illustrator

  • Window Music by Anastasia Suen (1998)
  • Delivery by Anastasia Suen (1999)
  • Big, Bad, and a Little Bit Scary: Poems that Bite Back! (2001)
  • Red Are the Apples by Marc Harshman and Cheryl Ryan (2001)
  • Liberty Rising: the Story of the Statue of Liberty by Pegi Deitz Shea (2005)
  • Lucky Jake by Sharon Hart Addy (2007)
  • Pony Island by Candice F. Ransom (2009)

Selected Resources

Young, Hazel ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Hazel Young, of New Castle Maine, wrote working girl cookbooks in the mid 20th century.

Selected Bibliography

  • The working girl Must Eat(1938)
  • Better Meals for Less Money (1940)
  • The Working Girl's Own Cook Book (1948)
  • Islands of New England (1954)

Dingley, Fred (1908 - 2008)

Genre: Poetry

Poet and author Fred R. Dingley graduated from South Portland High School and attended Bates College (AB cum laude, 1930, MA, 1937); Ricker College (Honorary Dr. Pedagogy, 1963) and Bowdoin College (Honorary Dr. Humane Letters, 1968). He worked as an educator at many Maine schools, as teacher, guidance counselor and principal.

Bibliography

Poetry

  • Six Hundred Acres (1980)
  • Eyes to See (1986)

Prose

  • A History of a Frontier School: Lee Academy 1845-1988 (1989)
  • I Like to Teach, Or, the Finger of God (1992)

Young, Charlie (1887 - 1962)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Maine fisherman, Charlie York, shared stories and letters of his adventures with educator and author Harold B. Clifford. Papers relating to the writing of this book can be found in the Special Collections Department of the University of Maine

Selected Bibliography

  • Charlie York, Maine Coast Fisherman (1974)

Dodge, Marshall (1935 - 1982)

Genre: General Fiction

Humorist, philosopher, author, and adopted Mainer Marshall J. Dodge III was born and raised in New York City and lived in Bristol, ME. He was the "I" in the iconic "Bert and I" Maine humor team (Robert Bryan being the "Bert"). He attended St. Paul's School and received his M.A. in philosophy from Yale. In 1958 he and Bryan (a fellow Eli) released their first "Bert and I" record. The rest is history. Dodge is credited with initiating the Maine Festival, first held at Bowdoin College, a celebration of Maine culture. He was killed at the age of 46 by a hit-and-run driver in Waimea, HI while on an around-the-world tour.

Selected Bibliography

Books

  • "Frost, You Say?": A Yankee Monologue (1973)
  • Bert And I: And Other Stories From Down East with Robert Bryan (1981)
  • Bert And I For Kids Of All Ages : Tales From Down East with Robert Bryan (2001)

Sound Recording

  • The Best Of Bert And I-- Celebrating 50 Years Of Stories From Down East (2008)
  • Bert And I-- On Stage Marshall Dodge Live (2008)

Videorecording

  • A Downeast Smile-In With Marshall Dodge (1997)

Dolbier, Maurice (1911 - 1993)

Genre: Children's Literature, Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction

Author, actor, radio-personality Maurice Dolbier was born and raised in Skowhegan, ME. He graduated from Skowhegan High School in 1929, then studied dramatics at the Whitehouse Academy in Boston. He was an announcer at the radio station WABI in Bangor, radio editor of the Providence Journal and a news analyst. He wrote two novels, six children's books and several plays.

Selected Bibliography

  • Jenny, the Bus that Nobody Loved (1944)
  • The Magic Shop (1946)
  • The Half Pint Jinni and other Stories (1948)
  • Nowhere Near Everest (1955)
  • A Lion in the Woods (1955)
  • All Wrong On The Night; A Comedy Of Theatrical Errors (1966)
  • The Mortal Gods (1971)

Donovan, Josephine (1941 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Born in Manila in 1941, Donovan was evacuated from the Philippines with her mother a few months before Pearl Harbor. Her father, a Captain in the U. S. Army, remained in the Philippines where he was captured by the Japanese in 1942, remaining a P.O.W. for the duration. His memoirs, edited by his daughter, were recently published as P.O.W. in the Pacific: Memoirs of an American Doctor in World War II.

She graduated, cum laude, from Bryn Mawr College in 1962 with a major in history, after spending her Junior Year in Europe. After graduation she worked as a Copy Desk clerk at The Washington Post and Time Magazine and as a general assignment reporter on a small newspaper in upstate New York. During this period she completed a course in Creative Writing at Columbia University.

She received her M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in comparative literature from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1967 and 1971, respectively. She has held academic positions at several universities and worked for a time as a Copy Editor for G. K. Hall in Boston. She recently retired early from her position as Professor of English (tenured) at the University of Maine, Orono, in order to devote full time to her writing. She lives on the coast of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sarah Orne Jewett (1980)
  • New England Local Color Literature: A Women?s Tradition (1983)
  • Feminist Theory: The Intellectual Traditions of American Feminism (1985)
  • After the Fall: The Demeter-Persephone Myth in Wharton, Cather and Glasgow (1989)
  • Gnosticism in Modern Literature: A Study of Selected Works of Camus, Sartre, Hesse, and Kafka (1990)
  • Uncle Tom?s Cabin: Evil, Affliction, and Redemptive Love (1991)
  • Women and the Rise of the Novel, 1405-1726 (1999)

Dorian, Edith (1900 - 1983)

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery, Non-Fiction, Young Adult

Born in New Jersey, Edith M. Dorian taught in the English Department at Rutgers University, in the New Jersey College for Women. She also taught at the Bates Summer School, one season. She was an alumna of Smith College, with graduate work at Harvard and Columbia. She experimented first with short stories and then moved on to longer novels for young adults.

Selected Bibliography

  • No Moon On Graveyard Head/ By Edith Dorian (1953)
  • Trails West And Men Who Made Them (1955)
  • The Twisted Shadow (1956)
  • Animals that Made US History (1964)
  • High-Water Cargo (1965)

Selected Websites

Dresser, Horatio (1866 - 1954)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Philosopher, editor and author Horatio W. Dresser was born in Yarmouth, ME. His parents were followers of P.P. Quimby and the New Thought Movement. He recived his A. B., Master's and Ph.D all from Harvard. He worked as publisher and editor of his own publication, Journal of Practical Metaphysics, which later merged with Arena for which he became assistant editor. He wrote several books dealing with metaphysics and the New Thought Movement.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Quimby Manuscripts: Showing the Discovery of Spiritual Healing and the Origin of Christian Science (1921)
  • A History of Modern Philosophy (1928)
  • Outlines of the Psychology of Religion (1929)

du Houx, Emily ( - )

Genre: Illustrator

Illustrator Emily Cornell du Houx lives in Portland, ME. She is a Fine Arts graduate of Amherst College.

Selected Bibliography

  • Manitou: a Mythological Journey in Time by Ramona du Houx (1999)
  • A Voice for the Redwoods by Loretta Halter (2001)
  • Nighthawk's Dreams by Jesse Arbour (2002)
  • Madalynn the Monarch butterfly and her quest to Michoacan by Mary Baca Hague (2003)
  • Martin McMillan and the Lost Inca City by Elaine Russell (2004)
  • Millicent the Magnificent by Burton R. Hoffmann (2004)
  • Two Birds in a Box: a True Story by KT Valliere-Denis Ouilette (2005)
  • Wisdom of Bear by Holly Barry, Ramona du Houx, Dawn Renee Levesque (2005)
  • Seasons: Poems by David Kroner & Ramona du Houx (2006)

Dumas, Jacqueline ( - 2010)

Genre: Poetry

Poet Jacqueline M. Dumas was born and raised in Rumford, ME. She lived in Milan, NH but summered in the Coburn Gore/Eustis ME region. She began writing poetry when inspired by her son who lost an arm in an accident at age 14. She served in the U.S. Navy for three years, then another three years in the U.S. Army Reserve. She attended the University of Oklahoma and Georgetown University.

Selected Bibliography

  • Tall Timber Poems (1971)
  • North Country Ballads (1975)
  • Bunkhouse Ballads and Other Verse (1984)

Dunn, Esther (1891 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Esther Cloudman Dunn was born in Portland, ME in 1891 and always claimed it as her native city. She graduated from Cornell University in 1913 and taught in the English department at Bryn Mawr College for the following six years. She was a Shakespeare scholar and in 1922 received her Ph.D from the University of London, the first person to do so, then joined the Smith faculty in 1925 as a professor of English and Director of the Department of Special Honors.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ben Jonson's Art: Elizabethan Life and Literature as Reflected Therein (1925)
  • The Literature of Shakespeare's England (1936)
  • Shakespeare in America
  • The Liberal Arts College in War Time: An Address (1942)
  • Pursuit of Understanding: Autobiography of an Education (1945)

Selected Resources

Dunn, Martha (1848 - 1915)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Martha Baker Dunn was born and raised in Hallowell, ME. She attended Hallowell schools, and the Maine Wesleyan Seminary (later Kents Hill School). She received her doctor of Letters from Colby College in 1906. She contributed to many publications such as Youth's Companion and Atlantic Monthly and published stories as well as a volume of essays. Her portrait hangs in the Waterville Public Library where she was a trustee for many years.

Selected Bibliography

  • Memory Street: A Story of Life (1900)
  • 'Lias's Wife: An Island Story (1901)
  • Cicero in Maine: And Other Essays (1905)

Eastman, Harland (1929? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Harland H. Eastman grew up in Sanford, ME, graduated from Sanford High School (1947), Colby College (1951), the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts, and the London School of Economics. He served in the United States Foreign Service from 1955 til his retirement in 1979. He then became an active promoter of community pride in the Sanford-Springvale area. He is Chairman of the Sanford Historical Committee, President and Founder of the Sanford-Springvale Historical Society, and creator of the Sanford-Springvale Historical Museum.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sanford and Springvale, Maine, in the Days of Fred Philpot: A Photographic History (1985)
  • Alfred, Maine: the Shakers and the Village (1986)
  • Sanford and Springvale, Maine, A Backward Glance (1988)
  • A Cluster of Maine Villages: Sanford and Springvale, Acton, Shapleigh and Alfred (1991)
  • Villages on the Mousam: Sanford and Springvale, Maine (1995)

Greenbie, Sydney (1889 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Travel history writer Sydney Greebie contributed to Havelock Ellis, an Appreciation. Was Associate editor; Asia Magazine. Contributor to Harpers, Century, North American Review, Outlook, Asia, World Traveler, Harper's Bazaar, Green Book, etc.

He was president and organizer of Floating University, 1928-29. President, Traversity, a travel university, 1930-31 and editor, Leisure Magazine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Japan, real and imaginary (1920)
  • The Pacific Triangle (1921)
  • Gold of Ophir/cite> (1925)
  • Frontiers and the Fur Trade (1929)
  • Educators beyond their depth (monograph) (1929)
  • The Romantic East (1930)
  • Castine, a dramatized biography of a town (1948)

Selected Resources

Hallet, Richard (1887 - 1967)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Richard Mathews Hallet was born in Bath, ME but his family moved to Cambridge, MA where he grew up. He attended Cambridge Latin School, graduated from Harvard (1908) and Harvard Law School (1910). He clerked for the U.S. Circuit Court of New York for a year, then in 1912 shipped out on a British ship to Australia -- the first of many adventures about which he wrote. He also worked as a journalist for Gannett Newspapers, wrote articles for many magazines, and books of fiction.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Canyon of the Fools (1922)
  • The Rolling World (1938)
  • Michael Beam (1939)
  • Foothold of Earth (1944)

Selected Resources

Kelly, Eric (1884 - 1960)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction

Eric P. Kelly was born in 1884 in Amesbury, Massachusetts and attended Dartmouth College (BA, 1906). He was a journalist, academic and author of children's books. He was also a professor of English at Dartmouth College and briefly a lecturer at the Jagiellonian University in Krakw. He won the 1929 Newbery Medal recognizing his first published book, The Trumpeter of Krakow and retired from teaching in 1954, splitting his time between Chebeague Island, Maine, and Ojo Caliente, New Mexico.

Selected Bibliography

  • Three Sides of Agiochook: a Tale of the New England Frontier in 1775

Selected Resources

Kempton, Kenneth (1891 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Kenneth Payson Kempton was born and raised in Massachusetts, but his father was a Mainer and brought his son there every year for fishing trips. Kempton purchased land in the Boothbay Harbor region with the intention of building a boys' camp and returned their every summer. He was an instructor of English at Harvard and Radcliffe and wrote articles and stories as well as his novels of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Old Man Greenlaw (1936)
  • Monday go to Meeting (1937)

Selected Resources

Eaton, Jil (1949 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Designer Jil Eaton lived in Farmington and Falmouth when growing up. She studied painting at Skidmore and Colby and graphic design at Harvard's Graduate School of Design. She started with her own graphic design business in Portland and, after her son was born, began designing knitted fashions for children. She now owns a knitwear design business called MinnowKnits based in Portland.

Selected Bibliography

  • Minnowknits: Uncommon Clothes to Knit for Kids (1996)
  • Minnowknits, Too: More Uncommon Knits for Kids, Big and Small (1998)
  • SimpleChic: Designer Knits, SuperQuick! (2003)
  • After Dark: Uncommon Knits for Night Time (2004)
  • Puppyknits: 12 Quickknit Fashions for Your Best Friend (2005)
  • Minnies: Quickknits for Babies and Toddlers (2005)
  • Top Dog Knits: 12 Quickknit Fashions for Your Big Best Friend (2007)

Lamprey, Lunnette (AKA) Louise (1869 - 1951)

Genre: Children's Literature

Lunnette E. Lamprey (AKA Louise Lamprey) was born in Alexandria NH, was educated at home and at Concord High School and received her bachelor's degree from Mount Holyoke College (1891). She worked as an editorial writer for The Capital, a weekly Washington, D.C. newspaper and for the daily Washington Times, did magazine, newspaper and secretarial work in New York and was a writer in the Republican National Campaign of 1904. She worked summers at a Vermont children's camp as a story-teller and craft teacher and in London doing office work and writing for a year before beginning her career as an author of books for children. She lived in Limerick, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • In the Days of the Guild (1918)
  • Masters of the Guild (1920)
  • Children of Ancient Britain (1921)
  • The Alo Man: Stories from the Congo (1921)
  • Days of the Discoverers (1921)
  • Children of Ancient Rome (1922)
  • Days of the Colonists (1922)
  • The Days of the Commanders (1923)
  • Days of the Pioneers (1924)
  • Days of the Leaders (1925)
  • Days of the Builders (1926)
  • Wonder Tales of Architecture (1927)
  • History of Limerick (1928)
  • All the Ways of Building (1933)
  • The Tomahawk Trial (1934)
  • The Limerick Pageant (1936)
  • The Story of Weaving (1939)

Selected Resources

MacMillan, Donald (1874 - 1970)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Donald Baxter MacMillan lived in Freeport, Maine and was educated at Bowdoin College, graduating in 1898 with a degree in geology.

He travelled over 30 times to the Artic studying the geology and the ethnicity of the local population.

He lectured and wrote books and articles based on his travels.

Selected Bibliography

  • Four years in the white North (1918)
  • Etah and beyond : or, Life within twelve degrees of the Pole (1927)
  • How Peary reached the Pole; the personal story of his assistant, Donald B. MacMillan.... (1934)

Selected Resources

Patch, Edith (1876 - 1954)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Edith Patch was born in 1876 in Worcester, Massachusetts. She loved to ramble through the fields surrounding her home and observe the plants and animals found there. When she was eight years old, her family moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota, and two years later, to a country home, where she could resume her rambles in the meadows. During her senior year in high school, her knowledge of insect life enabled her to write an essay on the monarch butterfly that won her a $25.00 prize. She used part of this handsome sum to buy a copy of the Manual for the Study of Insects by John Henry Comstock and illustrated by his wife Anna Comstock, both of whom were entomologists at Cornell University with whom she would later study. Edith Patch entered the University of Minnesota in 1897 and graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in 1901. She was interested in both science and writing. Because she could not find employment in science, she taught English in high school in Minnesota for two years. She continued to seek employment in entomology and finally, in 1903, Dr. Charles D. Woods of the Maine Agricultural Experiment Station at the University of Maine invited her to go to Orono, Maine, and organize a Department of Entomology there. He offered her no salary but arranged for her to teach English to earn a living wage. Dr. Woods received much ridicule for his appointment of a woman in a man?s field, but within a year, Edith Patch had established the department and earned herself a salaried position. She also proved her worth to Maine?s agriculture, forestry, and horticulture through the practical application of her knowledge of entomology.

Edith Patch earned a masters degree at the University of Maine in 1910 and in 1911 a doctorate at Cornell University, where she became a friend and colleague of the Comstocks. Honors followed: she was elected the first woman president of the Entomological Society of America in 1930, a time when few women were in the field. Agricultural industries around the world called on her expertise. She was an environmentalist and advocated the study of ecology before the word was in common parlance. Forty years before Rachel Carson?s Silent Spring was published, she warned against the indiscriminate use of pesticides. Throughout her long career, she never lost her concern for the education of the general public, and particularly children, to the wonders of science and the natural world. Edith Patch bought her Orono home, ?Braeside,? in 1913, and made its surrounding gardens, fields, and woods, a living laboratory for her nature studies. The house overlooked the Stillwater River, and a stream ran past it into the river. Her plants and trees supported insects and birds, which she also fed. She retired from the University of Maine in 1937 as ?Entomologist Emeritus,? and lived at ?Braeside? until her death in 1954. (from the Edith Patch website

Selected Bibliography

  • Dame Bug and Her Babies (1913)
  • How Laddie Tells the Time O'Year (1914)
  • First Lessons in Nature Study (1926)
  • Holiday Pond (1929)
  • Holiday Meadow (1930)
  • Hexapod Stories (1930)
  • Bird Stories (1930)
  • Holiday Hill (1931)
  • Hunting with Harrison E. Howe (1932)
  • Outdoor Visits with Harrison E. Howe (1932)
  • Science at Home with Harrison E. Howe (1934)
  • Holiday Shore (1935)
  • Mountain Neighbors with Carroll Lane Fenton (1936)
  • Desert Neighbors with Carroll Land Fenton (1937)
  • Forest Neighbors with Carroll Lane Fenton (1938)
  • Prairie Neighbors with Carroll Lane Fenton (1940)

Selected Resources

Patten, Gilbert (1866 - 1945)

Genre: General Fiction, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Short Stories

Gilbert Patten was born in Corinna, Maine and attended Corinna Union Academy. He worked at the Pittsfield Advertiser, then created in 1888 his own newspaper, the Corinna Owl. He wrote stories, mostly westerns, for Beadle's Half-Dime Library and was a writer of dime novels. He wrote westerns with the pen name Wyoming Bill, but is best known for his sporting stories in the Frank Merriwell series, written as Burt L. Standish.

Selected Bibliography

Gilbert Patten

  • The Deadwood Trail (1904)
  • Cliff Sterling Series 5 novels (1910-1916)

Burt L. Standish

  • Frank Merriwell Series 209 titles (1896-1930)

Selected Resources

Pendexter, Hugh (1875 - 1940)

Genre: General Fiction

Hugh Pendexter was born in Pittsfield, ME and graduated from Lewiston High School. He taught Latin and Greek in Maine high schools for a while, then moved to Rochester NY where he worked on the Rochester Post Express. He then moved back, married and settled in Norway, ME and devoted himself to writing, full time. He began his work as a humorous writer, but is best known as an historical fiction and western writer and for the amount of research that he put into each of his books.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Young Gem-hunters, or the Mystery of the Haunted Camp (1911)
  • The Young Timber-Cruisers, or, Fighting the Spruce Pirates (1911)
  • The Young Fisherman, or, The King of Smugglers' Island 1912)
  • Young Woodsmen, or Running Down the Squaw-tooth Gang (1912)
  • Young Sea-Merchants, or, After Hidden Treasure (1913)
  • Young Trappers,, or, The Quest of the Giant Moose (1913)
  • The Young Loggers, or, the Gray Axeman of Mt. Crow (1917)
  • Red Belts (1920)
  • Kings of the Missouri (1921)
  • A Virginia Scout (1922)
  • Pay Gravel (1923)
  • Old Misery (1924)
  • The Wife-ship Woman (1925)
  • Harry Idaho (1926)
  • The Red Road: A Romance of Braddock's Defeat (1927)
  • The Road to El Dorado (1929)
  • Gentlemen of the North (1929)
  • The Gate Through the Mountain
  • Partners (1930)
  • Over the Ridge (1931)
  • Red Autumn (1931)
  • Rifle Rule (1932)
  • The Scarlet Years (1932)
  • The Trail of Pontiac (1933)
  • The Flaming Frontier
  • Log Cabin Men (1934)
  • Red Man's Courage (1934)
  • White Dawn (1935)
  • The River Frontier (1935)
  • The Torch-bearers (1936)
  • Go-ahead Davie (1936)

  • The Homesteaders (1937)

  • Maine Authors: a Collection of Clippings from the Portland Sunday Telegram

Pulsifer, Harold (1886 - 1948)

Genre: Poetry

Harold Trowbridge Pulsifer was born in Manchester, CT. He graduated from Harvard in 1911 and lived in Mountainville, NY. He was a magazine writer and editor, poet, naturalist and enthusiastic trout fisherman. He edited The Outlook magazine, a publication founded by his grandfather, from 1913 to 1928 and was an award-winning poet. He retired to Harpswell, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mothers and Men: a Book of Poems (1916)
  • "Glory o' the Dawn" (1923)
  • Harvest of Time: Poems (1932)
  • First Symphony: a Sonnet Sequence (1935)
  • Elegy for a House (1935)
  • Rowan: a Collection of Verse (1937)
  • Poems: 1912-1947 (1954)

Selected Resources

Rowe, William (1882 - 1955)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

William H. Rowe was born on a farm in Yarmouth in 1882, the child of Mary Jane and Charles Rowe. For much of his life, he lived in his grandparents' home on Bridge Street with his wife Anna. He attended Colby College and later owned a pharmacy on Main Street. William Rowe authored books on shipbuilding and on the history of Yarmouth. Active in the community, he served on the Yarmouth School Committee. At the time of his death, Mr. Rowe was the town clerk and had been for 39 years.

Selected Bibliography

  • Yarmouth Personages, an Introduction. An Attempt to Revive the Memory of Individuals Whose Names were Once Household Words in old North Yarmouth and Yarmouth (191?)
  • Shipbuilding Days and Tales of the Sea, in Old North Yarmouth and Yarmouth, Maine (1924)
  • Shipbuilding Days in Casco Bay, 1727-1890: Being Footnotes to the Maritime History of Maine (1929)
  • Ancient North Yarmouth and Yarmouth, Maine, 1636-1936: A History (1937)
  • The Maritime History of Maine: Three Centuries of Shipbuilding and Seafaring (1948)
  • The Yarmouth Poets (1955)

Selected Resources

-Maine Authors: a Collection of Clippings from the Portland Sunday Telegram - Maine Author Scrapbooks : a Collection of Newspaper Clippings Vol. 4

Sawyer, Edith (1869 - )

Genre:

Author Edith A. Sawyer lived in Fryeburg, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mary Cameron : A Romance Of Fisherman's Island (1899)
  • The Way of Ume (1928)
  • The Abiding Of Um : [Um No Kakurega] (1932)

Selected Resources

Sterling, Robert (1876 - 1958)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Born at Peak's Island, Maine, Robert Thayer Sterling was educated in the local public schools and was for a number of years a reporter for various Portland papers, covering the waterfront news. He then became a lighthouse keeper, eventually stationed at Portland Head Light, and wrote about the history of lighthouses in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Lighthouses of the Maine coast and the men who keep them (1935)

Selected Resources

Tolman, Albert (1886 - 1965)

Genre: General Fiction, Young Adult

Albert W. Tolman was a native of Camden, ME. He graduated from Portland High School and Bowdoin College (1888). He was a professor of English at Bowdoin, practiced law in Portland, wrote a series of "boys' adventure stories" and sold more than 700 stories and articles to magazines such as Youths' Companion.

Selected Bibliography

  • Jim Spurling, Fisherman: Or, Making Good (1918)
  • Jim Spurling, Millman (1921)
  • Jim Spurling, Leader: Or, Ocean Camp (1926)

Selected Resources

Underwood, Edna (1873 - 1961)

Genre:

Edna Worthley Underwood was born in Phillips, ME and moved to Arkansas City KS in 1882 where she graduated from Arkansas City High School as valedictorian. She attended Garfield University in Wichita KS then the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, MI where she took her degree. She taught in Arkansas City schools then moved to NYC and began writing and translating works of poetry, prose and short stories.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Book of the White Peacocks (1915)
  • Three Chinese Masterpieces (translation) (1927)
  • Attic Twilights: [Poems] (1928)
  • The Book of Seven Songs (translation) (1928)
  • Egyptian Twilights: [Poem] (1928)
  • Masque of the Moons (1928)
  • Improvisations... (1929)
  • The Taste of Honey: The Note Book of a Linguist (1930)
  • Maine Summers: Sonnets to My Mother (1940)

Selected Resources

Verrill, Alpheus (1871 - 1954)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Alpheus Hyatt Verrill was born in New Haven, CT, atended Hopkins Grammar School, the Yale School of Fine Arts and studied zoology and geology at the Yale Sheffield Scientific School. He illustrated the natural history section of Webster's International Dictionary in 1896 and the Clarendon Dictionary. He traveled the globe, living in Dominica, British Guiana and Panama.

Selected Bibliography

  • Old Civilizations of the New World (1929)
  • Barton's Mills: A Saga of the Pioneers (1932)
  • Romantic and Historic Maine (1933)
  • Along New England Shores (1936)
  • The Real Americans (1954)
  • The American Indian: North, South and Central America (2001)

Selected Resources

Vinal, Harold (1891 - 1965)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Harold Vinal, a poet and editor was born on Vinalhaven in 1891. He died on Vinalhaven in 1965. He made significant contributions to American poetry of the mid 20th century. His influence is best reflected in the magazine Voices: A Magazine of Verse which he edited and published. He also served as president of the Poetry Society of America.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry

  • The Compass Eye (1944)
  • Hymn to Chaos (1931)
  • Nor youth nor age (1925)
  • A stranger in heaven (1927)
  • White April

Non-Fiction

  • Attic for the Nightingale: a Sheaf of Informal Essays (1934)
    • Hurricane: a Maine Coast Chronicle (1936)

Selected Resources

Wasson, Mildred (1890 - 1978)

Genre: General Fiction

Novelist Mildred Wasson grew up in the suburbs of Boston, lived for a time in Colorado Springs, CO then moved to Bangor, ME in 1916. She lived in Maine for the rest of her life.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Big House (1926)
  • Nancy: A Story of the Younger Set (1932)
  • Miss Nancy Prentiss (1934)
  • Nancy Sails (1936)

Selected Resources

Waterman, Charles (1868 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Journalist and author Charles E. Waterman was a native Mainer, living in Oxford, Paris Hill, Norway and Mechanic Falls, ME. He graduated from Hebron Academy, then went to work in the offices of the Oxford Democrat. He also worked for the Lowell Morning Times, the Cambridge Chronicle, the Charlestown Independent and the Boston Herald.

Selected Bibliography

  • Historical Sketch of the Town of Mechanic Falls (1894)
  • the Maine Watermans: With an Account of their Ancestors in Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut (1906)
  • Maine Gem Stones (1910)
  • The Oxford Hills: And Other Papers (1929?)
  • A City on a Hill (Paris Hill) with High Lights that Hit It (1931)
  • Measured Fancies (1931)
  • The White Fawn: A Tale of the Land of Molecunkamunk (1931)
  • Carib Queens (1932)
  • Apiatia: Litle Essays on Honey-Makers (1933)

Selected Resources

Edwards, Gail ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Athens ME resident Gail Faith Edwards is an internationally-recognized Community Herbalist. With her daughter, Rosa Fangboner, she runs Blessed Maine Herb Farm, a certified organic medicinal herb product company located in Athens, ME. She also teaches herbal workshops at her farm, a course through distance learning and an annual tour to Southern Italy.

Selected Bibliography

  • Opening Our Wild Hearts to the Healing Herbs (2000)
  • Traversing the Wild Terrain of Menopause: Herbal Allies for Midlife Women & Men (2003)

Elliot, Robert (1902 - 2002)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Robert O. E. Elliot was born in Hyde Park, MA but spent much of his younger years in Woolwich ME. He graduated from Hampton Academy (1920) and attended Boston University studying journalism. He worked on the Hampton Union newspaper, the Boston Herald-Traveler and The Portsmouth Herald. He also wrote a rod and gun column for the Portsmouth Herald. He worked for many years in several Maine state agencies promoting the state for recreation and tourism purposes. During his retirement, he wrote several books and over 100 articles and stories which appeared in Field and Stream, Outdoor Life, Sports Afield, True, Argosy, Fur Fish and Game and many others. He also served as contributing editor to Field and Stream for several years and contributed to several hunting and fishing encyclopedias.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Eastern Brook Trout: With Pointers on Where and How to Fish for Them (1950)
  • All About Brook Trout From Maine to California: With Pointers on Where and How to Fish for Them (1954)
  • Bass Fishing in New England (1973)
  • The Making of an Angler (1975)
  • Northeastern Bass Fishing (1977)

Selected Resources

English, Oliver (1901 - 1993)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Oliver Spurgeon English was born and raised in Presque Isle, ME. He graduated from Presque Isle High School (1918), then attended the University of ME (1922), Jefferson Medical College (1924), and studied for two years at the Berlin Psychoanalytic Institute. He was appointed to the staff of Temple University Medical School as a professor in 1933 and became head of that department in 1938.

Selected Bibliography

  • Common Neuroses of Children and Adults with Gerald H. J. Pearson (1937)
  • Emotional Problems of Living; Avoiding the Neurotic Pattern with Gerald H. J. Pearson (1945)
  • with Constance J. Foster (1951)

Fairburn, William (1876 - 1947)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

William Armstrong Fairburn's family emigrated from Huddersfield, England to Bath, ME (1889-1890) when he was a child. He attended Bath schools and apprenticed himself to the local shipyard. He studied naval engineering, designed ships and later became president of the Diamond Match Company. His writings were mostly concerned with sociology in the workplace.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Individual and Society (1915)
  • Mentality and Freedom: Essays (1917)
  • The Diagnosis of German Obsession (1918)
  • Frederick the Great (1919)
  • Organization and Success: Essays (1923)
  • Life and Work: Essays (1925)
  • Loyalty: An Ideal, A Philosophy, A Religion (1926)
  • Justice and Law (1927)
  • The International Goal of Russian Communism (1931)
  • America's Attitude to Soviet Russia (1931)
  • Russia, the Utopia in Chains (1931)
  • Work and Workers: Essays and Miscellaneous Writings (1933)

Feil, Charles (1948 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Author, aviator, photographer and adventurer Charles Feil lives in South Portland, ME. He and his self-made gyroplane, Rooty Kazooty, have traveled all over the United States taking aerial photographs.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine: A View from Above (1996)
  • Lighthouses from Aloft: 51 Scenic New England Lights (1997)
  • Massachusetts, a View from Above (1998)
  • Vermont: A View from Above (1999)
  • Kittery to Calais: The Maine Coast from Above with Jeff Clark (2000)
  • Napa Valley: A View from Above (2002)
  • Maine: Guess Where from the Air with Murad Sayen (2007)

Fern, Fanny (1811 - 1872)

Genre:

SEE: Parton, Sara (Grata) Payson Willis

FitzGerald, Frances (1940 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Frances FitzGerald is an award-winning journalist and author who lives in New York City and Northeast Harbor, ME. She was born and raised in New York, graduated from Radcliffe College, B.A. magna cum laude, in 1962. She won a Pulitzer Prize and a National Book Award for her first book, Fire in the Lake in 1973. FitzGerald's writing has also appeared in The New Yorker, and the New York Review of Books, The New York Times Magazine, Esquire, Architectural Digest, and Rolling Stone. She serves on the editorial boards of The Nation and Foreign Policy, and is vice-president of International PEN.

Selected Bibliography

  • Fire in the Lake: The Vietnamese and the Americans in Vietnam (1972)
  • America Revised: History Schoolbooks in the Twentieth Century (1979)
  • Cities on a Hill: A Journey Through Contemporary American Cultures (1986)
  • Way Out There in the Blue: Reagan, Star Wars, and the End of the Cold War (2000)

Fontes, Justine ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Justine Fontes was born in New York City and grew up on Long Island. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. in English Literature from New York University. While a freshman there, she found her first job in the publishing industry. She worked at several different publishers before becoming a freelance writer. While working at Little Golden Books, Justine met her future husband, Ron Fontes. They started writing together and have written over 500 children's books. They have lived in Maine sine 1988.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Littlest Leprechaun (2003)
  • Meet Strawberry Shortcake (2003)
  • Where are Custard and Pupcake? (2003)
  • Tales of the Terminal Diner (2003)
  • Black Meets White (2005)
  • Rachel Carson with Ron Fontes (2005)
  • My First Day of Preschool (2006)
  • Itchy Mitch with Ron Fontes (2007)
  • Atalanta: The Race Against Destiny: A Greek Myth with Ron Fontes (2007)
  • The Trojan Horse: The Fall of Troy: A Greek Legend with Ron Fontes (2007)
  • Demeter & Persephone: Spring Held Hostage with Ron Fontes (2007)
  • Captured by Pirates with Ron Fontes (2007)

Ford, Elaine ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Novelist Elaine Ford is a professor emeritus at the University of Maine and lives in Harpswell.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ivory Bright (1986)
  • Monkey Bay (1989)
  • Life Designs: a Novel (1997)
  • The American Wife (2007)

Wuori, G. K. (1944 - )

Genre: General Fiction

G. K. Wuori worked for both Bangor Theological Seminary and the University of Maine Presque Isle. In his own words, "I lived in Maine from 1989 to 1996 and was employed at Bangor Theological Seminary and, later, at the University of Maine at Presque Isle. I truly enjoyed my time in Maine and found it to be an inspiration for some of the hundred-plus short stories I've published in various literary journals and magazines. Maine played a major role in my first two published books as well."

Selected Bibliography

  • An American Outrage: a Novel of Quillifarkeag, Maine (2000)
  • Nude in Tub: Stories of Quillifarkeag, Maine (1999)
  • Now That I'm Ready To Tell You Everything (2011)

Selected Resources

Woods, Leonard (1807 - 1878)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Leonard Woods was the fourth president of Bowdoin College. He served in that position from 1839-1866. Woods received advanced degrees from Colby College, Harvard and Bowdoin. He studies and taught at Bangor Theological Seminary.

Selected Bibliography

  • An address on the Life and Character of Parker Cleaveland, LL. D.: delivered in Augusta, January 19, 1859 before the Maine Historical Society
  • A Eulogy on Daniel Webster: Delivered by Request of the City Government and Citizens of Portland, Wednesday, Nov. 17, 1852

Selected Resources

Fox, Nicols ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Author and bookseller Nicols Fox was born in Virginia. She is a graduate of Mary Baldwin College in Stuanton, VA and received her M.F.A. in creative writing and literature from Bennington College (1999). She has written several books and her work has appeared in publications such as The Economist, The New York Times, Newsweek, Maine Times and Down East, among many others. She lives on the coast of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Spoiled: The Dangerous Truth About a Food Chain Gone Haywire (1997)
  • Alone Together (2002)
  • Against the Machine: The Hidden Luddite Tradition in Literature, Art, and Individual Lives (2002)

Wolff, Meg (1957 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Meg Wolff, a two-time cancer survivor and healthy food expert/promoter, lives in Maine. In addition to her books Wolff is also a contributor to the Huffington Post.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Life in Balance: Delicious, Plant-based Recipes for Optimal Health (2010)
  • Becoming Whole: the Story of my Complete Recovery from Breast Cancer (2006)
  • Breast Cancer Exposed: The Connection Between Food and Survival

Selected Resources

Winslow, Ola (1885 - 1977)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Pulitzer Prize winning historian, Ola Elizabeth Winslow, retired to Darmiscotta Maine where she died in 1977.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Destroying Angel: The Conquest of Smallpox in Colonial Boston (1974)
  • John Bunyan (1961)
  • John Eliot: Apostle to the Indians (1968)
  • Jonathan Edwards, 1703-1758; a Biography (1940 Pulitzer Prize winner
  • Master Roger Williams: a Biography (1957)
  • Meetinghouse Hill, 1630-1783 (1952)
  • Portsmouth: The Life of a Town (1966)
  • Samuel Sewall of Boston (1964)

Fraustino, Lisa ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's author Lisa Rowe Fraustino is a native of Guilford, ME, lives in Pennsylvania and summers in Bowerbank on the banks of Sebec Lake in Maine. She earned her Ph.D from Binghamton University and is an associate professor of English at Eastern Connecticut State University.

Selected Bibliography

  • Grass and Sky (1994)
  • Ash: A Novel (1995)
  • Dirty Laundry: Stories About Family Secrets (1998)
  • The Hickory Chair (2001)
  • Don't Cramp My Style: Stories About That Time of the Month (2004)
  • The Hole in the Wall (2010)

Morrison, Dave (1959 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Poet and writer Dave Morrison was born just outside Reading, MA. He attended the New School University in New York City, then began publishing short stories and poetry. His work has been included in several anthologies as well as in such publications as Rattle, Opium,and Wolf Moon Press. He also was the host of a radio show called "Have Poems, Will Travel" on WRFR-FM in Rockland,ME.

Selected Bibliography

Novels

  • Hideaway (?)
  • Camaro (?)

Poetry

  • Sweet: New and Selected Poems (2006)
  • Brand New Day: Poems (2007)
  • Sliver: Poems (2008)
  • Black Boat, Black Water, Black Sand: New and Selected Poems (2009)
  • The Lonely Life of Spies: Poems (2009)
  • Clubland: Poems (2011)
  • Fail (2012)
  • Cancer Poems (2015)
  • Psalms (2017)
  • Welcome Homesick (2018)
  • Refuge (2019)
  • Blue (2020)

McBride, Mekeel (1950 - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet Mekeel McBride was born in Pittsburgh, PA, received her B.A. from Mills College in 1972, and was a Radcliffe Institute Fellow in 1976. She is a professor of English at the University of New Hampshire.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Deepest Part of the River: Poems (2001)
  • Wind of the White Dresses (2002)

Guernsey, Bruce ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Poet, author and educator Bruce Guernsey graduated with honors from Colgate University (1966), received M.A.s from the University of Virginia and The John Hopkins University, and a PhD from the University of New Hampshire. He is Distinguished Professor Emeritus at Eastern Illinois University where he taught creative writing and American Literature for twenty-five years. He has also taught at William and Mary, Johns Hopkins, the University of New Hampshire, and Virginia Wesleyan College where he was the poet in residence for four years. His poetry has appeared in publications such as Poetry, The Atlantic, and American Scholar. His prose works have been published in magazines such as War, Literature, and the Arts, The Virginia Quarterly Review, and Fly Rod & Reel.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry

  • Lost Wealth (1974)
  • January Thaw (1982)
  • The Lost Brigade (2004)
  • New England Primer (2008)

Weston, Christine (1904 - 1989)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction

Novelist Christine Weston nee Goutiere was born in India. She married Robert Weston in 1923 and moved with him to Maine. She died in Bangor in 1989.

Selected Bibliography

Works for Adults

  • Be Thou the Bride (1940)
  • The World is a Bridge (1950)
  • There and Then Short stories (1947)
  • Indigo (1943)
  • The Devil's Foot (1942)
  • The Dark Wood (1946)

Works for Children

  • Afghanistan
  • Bhimsa: the Dancing Bear (1945)
  • Ceylon 1960

Selected Resources

Gardner, John (1905 - 1995)

Genre: Non-Fiction

John Gardner was born and raised in Calais,ME. He graduated from Calais Academy (1923) then went on the the Machias Normal School to train to be a teacher. He received his Masters from Teacher's College at Columbia University in 1932. He went to work in a boatyard in Marblehead, MA building and designing boats. He began writing for the Maine Coast Fisherman (now National Fisherman) in 1951 and continued as its technical editor until his death. After his retirement in 1964, he began working to build the small boat program at Mystic Seaport. He worked there until just before his death at the age of 90 in 1995.

Selected Bibliography

  • Building Classic Small Craft (1977)
  • The Dory Book (1987)
  • Classic Small Craft You Can Build (1993)
  • Wooden Boats to Build and Use (1996)
  • Building Classic Small Craft: Complete Plans and Instructions for 47 Boats (1997)

Gay, Maude (1876 - 1952)

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Maude Clark Gay was born and raised in Waldoboro, ME and was educated at Waldoboro High School and Lincoln Academy. She served in both the Maine House of Representatives and the Maine Senate, was president of the Maine Writers Club, and served on the local school board and as a library trustee. She began writing and submitting poetry and stories as a teenager.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Knitting of the Souls: A Tale of 17th Century Boston (1904)
  • Paths Crossing: A Romance of the Plains (1908)
  • Echoes From Old Doorways: Little Romances of Early Maine (1922)
  • Five Women: Little Romances of Early Maine (1930)

Selected Resources

Geagan, William (1903 - 1974)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Short Stories

William H. Geagan was born and raised in Bangor. His love of nature and the outdoors began at an early age and even as a youngster he drew and wrote about it. After he graduated from Bangor High School, he bought a cabin in the woods and spent two years there, writing articles and stories about the outdoors and submitting them to various national publications. Eventually, this led to a long career in outdoors and sports writing, a nationally syndicated outdoor column, and positions on the sports staff at the Bangor Daily Commercial and the Bangor Daily News.

Selected Bibliography

  • Nature I Loved (1952)
  • The Good Trail (1954)
  • Seed on the Wind (1957)

Selected Resources

Welsh, Shepherd (1929 - 2007)

Genre: General Fiction

Born March 13, 1929, in Brooklyn, New York speechwriter Shepherd Welsh of Dresden and Bath published three books. he died in 2007.

Selected Bibliography

  • Scarecrow Soldiers (1981)
  • Tales from the American Attic (1988)
  • Gettysburg (1990)

Selected Resources

Geller, Norman (1935 - 1992)

Genre: Children's Literature

Rabbi Norman Geller was born in Roxbury, graduated from Boston Latin School, and received his bachelor's and master's degrees from Boston University. He received further training in education and speech pathology at various colleges and universities, and his religious training at various Hebrew schools and seminaries.

Selected Bibliography

  • The First Seven Days: A Poem (1983)
  • Talk to God -- I'll Get the Message (1983)
  • David's Seder (1983)
  • "I Don't Want to Visit Grandma Anymore" (1984)
  • It's Not the Jewish Christmas (1985)
  • Farfel: The Cat That Left Egypt (1987)

Weiss, Malcolm (1928 - 2010)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Malcolm Weiss was a former editor for Scholastic publishing. He moved to Maine in 1972. He wrote a number of books for Children and young people on scientific topics and principles. He died in 2010.

Selected Bibliography

  • 666 Jellybeans! All that?: An Introduction to Algebra (1976)
  • Far Out Factories: Manufacturing in Space (1984)
  • Gods, Stars, and Computers: Fact and Fancy in Myth and Science (1980)
  • Seeing Through the Dark: Blind and Sighted--a Vision Shared (1976)
  • Solomon Grundy, Born on Oneday: a Finite Arithmetic Puzzle illustrated by Tomie de Paola (1977)

Selected Resources

Gibbs, Alonzo (1915 - 1992)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Poet and author Alonzo Gibbs lived in Waldoboro, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Weather-House: [Poems] (1959)
  • The Fields Breathe Sweet (1963)
  • The Least Likely One (1964)
  • A Man's Calling (1966)
  • By a Sea-Coal Fire (1968)
  • Drift South (1969)
  • Son of a Mile-Long Mother (1971)
  • One More Day (1971)
  • Sir Urian's Letters Home (1974)
  • Bremen Bygones with Iris Gibbs (1976)

Selected Web Resources

Weinberger, Caspar (1917 - 2006)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Caspar Weinberger born in California in 1917. He spent the majority of his life in public service first in the military during World War II. He served on the cabinets of three presidents, Nixon, Ford and Reagan. He was best known as Reagan's secretary of Defense. President Ford later pardoned him for his actions in the Iran contra Affair.

He met his wife, Maine native Jane Dalton in 1942. He died in Bangor March 27, 2006.

Selected Bibiliography

  • Chain of Command with Peter Schweizer (2005)
  • Fighting for Peace: Seven Critical Years in the Pentagon (1990)
  • Home of the Brave: Honoring the Unsung Heroes in the War on Terror with Wynton C. Hall (2006)
  • In the Arena: a Memoir of the 20th Century with Gretchen Roberts (2001)
  • The Next War with Peter Schweizer (1996)

Selected Resources

Gibson, Charles (1928 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Charles Dana Gibson is a military and maritime historian and author. He was born in New York City and lives in Camden, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Merchantman? Or Ship of War: A Synopsis of Laws, U.S. State Department Positions and Practices Which Alter the Peaceful Character of U.S. Merchant Vessels in Time of War (1986)
  • Marine Transportation in War: The U.S. Army Experience, 1775-1860 (1992)
  • The Ordeal of Convoy NY 119: A Detailed Accounting of One of the Strangest World War II Convoys Ever to Cross the North Atlantic (1992)
  • Dictionary of Transports and Combatant Vessels, Steam and Sail, Employed by the Union Army 1861-1868 (1995)
  • Over Seas: U.S. Army Maritime Operations, 1898 Through the Fall of the Philippines (2002)

Gillman, Karen (1937 - 2018)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Psychologist Karen Gillman received her B.S. in Education from Oklahoma State University, an M.S. in Family Development from Virginia Polytechnic Institute, her Ph.D. in Counseling Psychology from the State University of New York at Albany and is a graduate of the SOPHIA program of the Traditional Acupuncture Institute in Columbia Maryland.

Selected Bibliography

  • whipped Cream on Rain: A Poetic Journal of a Caregiver (2001)
  • Mr. and Dr. Talking it Over: Communication for Professional Couples (2002)
  • Ashes in the Wind (2003)
  • Poems: One Way to Enter Myself Singing (2004)

Weil, Gordon (1937 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Gordon Weil graduated from Bowdoin College, Brunswick, Maine (A.B.), the College of Europe, Bruges, Belgium (Diploma) and Columbia University, New York (Ph.D. in Public Law and Government). He is a member of Phi Beta Kappa.

He was Commissioner of Business Regulation, Director of the Office of Energy Resources and Public Advocate of the State of Maine. He has served on numerous regional energy bodies and was chair of the national organization of state energy agencies.

He was the chair of the New England negotiations leading to the region?s electric transmission tariff and the Independent System Operator. A licensed energy broker, he has engaged in wholesale and retail power purchasing and power sales and strategy development for wholesale and large retail customers in the U.S. and Canada.

He has taught at several colleges and universities and is the author of 12 books and numerous articles on economic, governmental, and historical subjects.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Long Shot: George McGovern Runs for President (1973)
  • The Consumer's Guide to Banks (1975)
  • America Answers a Sneak Attack: Alcan and Al Qaeda (2005)

Selected Resources

Weber, Carl (1894 - 1966)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Carl J. Weber was an influential English professor at Colby College. He is credited with building the Colby Library Collection and being a prolific academic writer.

Selected Bibliography

  • An Introduction to English Versification (1931)
  • Fore-edge Painting; a Historical Survey of a Curious Art in Book Decoration (1966)
  • Hardy and the Lady from Madison Square (1952)
  • Thomas Hardy in Maine (1942)

Selected Resources

Weisbrot, Robert ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Robert Weisbrot has been on the faculty of Colby College since 1980. He is the Christian A. Johnson Distinguished Teaching Professor of History.

Selected Bibliography

  • Father Divine and the Struggle for Racial Equality (1993)
  • Freedom bound: a History of America's Civil Rights Movement (1990)
  • Maximum Danger: Kennedy, the Missiles, and the Crisis of American Confidence (2001)

Gilluly, Sheila ( - )

Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy

Sheila Gilluly was born in Rhode Island, attended high school and college in Arizona (B.A. English, University of Arizona 1973), received her M.A. in Religious Studies from Maryknoll School of Theology and has taught in Guam and now teaches English and Creative Writing here in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Greenbriar Queen (1988)
  • The Crystal Keep (1988)
  • Ritnym's Daughter (1989)
  • The Boy from the Burren: First Book of the Painter (1990)
  • The Giant of Inishkerry: The Second Book of the Painter (1992)
  • The Emperor of Earth-Above: [The Third Book of the Painter] (1993)

Gilmore, Albert (1868 - 1943)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Albert Field Gilmore was born and raised in Turner, ME and lived in New York and Boston. He was a graduate and trustee of Bates College, an editor and lecturer, and a leader in the church of Christian Science.

Selected Bibliography

  • Birds Through the Year (1910)
  • Fellowship: the Biography of a Man and a Business (1929)
  • The Christ at the Peace Table (1943)

Selected Resources

Waugh, Carol-Lynn (1947 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Carol-Lynn Rossel Waugh, a resident of Winthrop, has written and edited works for children and adults.

In an entry in Contemporary Authors Online, Gale, 2002 Waugh states that she has had three careers:

"I write children's books. I edit mystery anthologies with Martin H. Greenberg and others, and I am a very prominent entity in the world of teddy bears. This last facet has encompassed much of my work since the early 1980s. I was one of America's first teddy bear artists. I coined the term 'teddy bear artist' when I wrote my first article on the subject in 1981, in search of the work of my peers."

Selected Bibliography

Authored

  • Bearmaking 101: an Ins"bear"ational Course (1999)
  • Octagonal Houses of Maine (1982)
  • My Friend Bear (1992)

Edited

  • Twelve Crimes of Christmas with Martin Harry Greenberg and Isaac Asimov (1981)
  • The New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes: original stories edited with Martin Harry Greenberg (1987)

Selected Resources

  • Contemporary Authors Online, Gale, 2002. Available to Maine residents via the MARVEL

Pariser, Eli (1980 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Internet activist Eli Pariser was born in Lincolnville, ME. He graduated summa cum laude from Bard College at Simon's Rock with a B.A. in law and political science and is best known for his work with moveon.org. .

Selected Bibliography

  • The Filter Bubble: What the Internet is Hiding from You (2011)

Gilpatrick, Gil (1934 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Gil Gilpatrick was born, raised and has lived most of his life in and around the Skowhegan, ME area. He attended the University of Maine and spent six years in the Army. He has taught vocational arts at area high schools and was an instructor at one of the Maine Vocational schools. He is a well-known canoe designer and builder, an avid outdoorsman, and a registered Maine guide.

Selected Bibliography

  • Building a Strip Canoe (1979)
  • Building Snowshoes (1979)
  • The Canoe Guide's Handbook (1981)
  • Allagash, the Story of Maine's Legendary Wilderness Waterway (1983)
  • Building Outdoor Gear (1999)
  • Building Snowshoes and Snowshoe Furniture (2001)
  • The Allagash Guide: What You Need to Know to Canoe this Famous Waterway (2002)
  • The Outdoor Leader's Handbook: How to Plan, Supply and Guide an Outdoor Expedition for Two to Twelve People (2002>

Selected Resources

Goddard, Henry (1866 - 1957)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Henry Herbert Goddard was born and raised in East Vassalboro, ME. He attended Oak Grove Seminary in Vassalboro, Friends School in Providence, RI, and received both his undergraduate degree and his masters degree (in mathematics) from Haverford College (1887 and 1889) and his doctorate in psychology from Clark University. He taught in several schools and colleges. He is best known as a proponent of eugenics and for his studies of "feeble mindedness."

Selected Bibliography

  • The Kallikak Family: A Study in the Heredity of Feeble-Mindedness (1912)
  • School Training of Defective Children (1914)
  • Feeble-Mindedness: Its Causes and Consequences (1916)
  • Juvenile Delinquency (1921)
  • Our Children in the Atomic Age (1948)

Walton, Anthony (1960 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Poet, Anthony Walton, is a professor and the writer-in-residence at Bowdoin College. Born in 1960, he grew up in Illinois and was educated at Notre Dame and Brown Universities. His poetry and prose has appeared in The New York Times The New Yorker, and Kenyon Review as well as other periodicals and anthologies.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry

  • Cricket Weather (1995)

Non Fiction

  • Mississippi: an American Journey (1996)
  • Brothers in Arms: the Epic Story of the 761st Tank Battalion, WWII's Forgotten Heroes with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (2004)

Editor

  • Every Shut Eye Ain't Asleep: an Anthology of Poetry by African Americans Since 1945 with Michael Harper (1994)

Selected Resources

Goodman, Mitchell (1924? - 1997)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Social activist and author Mitchell Goodman was born in Brooklyn, NY and graduated from Harvard in 1946. He wrote travel articles for The New York Times and other magazines and a teacher of writing at several different colleges, including the University of Maine. He became an active voice against the Vietnam war and was one of the "Boston Five" who were prosecuted in the, so-called, "Spock Trial" in 1968. In his later years, he spoke out in support of unionized strikers and against nuclear power and weapons.

Selected Bibliography

  • The End of It: A Novel (1980)
  • A Life in Common: Poems (1984)
  • More Light: Selected Poems (1989)

Gould, Ralph (1870 - 1954)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Selected Bibliography

  • Yankee Storekeeper (1946)
  • Yankee Drummer (1947)
  • Yankee Boyhood: My Adventures on a Maine Farm Seventy Years Ago (1950)

Selected Resources

Graham, Ada (1931 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Educator and author Ada Graham was born in Dayton, OH and attended both Bowling Green State University and Hunter College receiving her bachelor's degree in 1957. She taught school in NY and in ME until 1970.

She and her husband Frank moved to Maine in 1961.

Selected Bibliography

  • Puffin Island (1971)
  • dooryard Garden; Tim & Jennifer's Calendar from Planning to Harvesting (1974)
  • The Adirondack Park: A Political History (1978)
  • Careers in Conservation (1980)
  • Jacob and Owl: A Story (1981)
  • Three Million Mice: A Story of Modern Medical Research (1981)
  • Bears in the Wild (1981)
  • Birds of the Northern Seas (1981)
  • Six Little Chickadees: A Scientist and Her Work with Birds (1982)
  • Kate Furbish and the Flora of Maine (1995)

Selected Web Resources

Graham, Frank (1925 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Frank Graham, JR. was from in New York, NY and received his bachelor's degree from Columbia University (1950). He worked for the New York Sun as a copy boy, as publicity director for the Brooklyn Dodgers and as managing editor for Sport. He and his wife Ada moved to Maine in 1961. During the 1980's, they began writing books for children.

Selected Bibliography

  • Casey Stengel: His Half-Century in Baseball (1958)
  • Margaret Chase Smith: Woman of Courage (1964)
  • Disaster by Default: Politics and Water Pollution (1966)
  • Oil and the Maine Coast: Is It Worth It? (1970)
  • Since Silent Spring (1970)
  • Man's Dominion: The Story of Conservation in America (1971)
  • Puffin Island (1971)
  • Where the Place Called Morning Lies (1973)
  • Dooryard Garden; Tim & Jennifer's Calendar from Planning to Harvesting (1974)
  • Gulls: A Social History (1975)
  • Potomac: The Nation's River (1976)
  • The Adirondack Park: A Political History (1978)
  • Careers in Conservation (1980)
  • Jacob and Owl: A Story (1981)
  • Three Million Mice: A Story of Modern Medical Research (1981)
  • Bears in the Wild (1981)
  • Birds of the Northern Seas (1981)
  • A Farewell to Heroes (1981)
  • Six Little Chickadees: A Scientist and Her Work with Birds (1982)
  • The Dragon Hunters (1984)
  • Warbler Watch (1991)
  • Kate Furbish and the Flora of Maine (1995)

Selected Web Resources

Graham, Elinor (1896 - 1984)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Elinor Graham and family moved to Maine after her husband retired from the Navy, settling on seacoast farm in Freeport. She wrote stories about the area people, as well as fiction.

Selected Bibliography

  • Our Way Down East (1943)
  • Maine Charm String (1946)
  • My Window Looks Down East (1951)

Selected Resources

McKinnon, Carolyn (1931 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Carolyn McKinnon was born in Bangor, attended high school in Portland and nursing school in Washington D. C. She used her experience as a registered nurse at the State-run mental institution in Bangor to write a book and screen play. Her work has also appeared in the Puckerbush Review.

Selected Bibliography

  • Insanity, Inc. (1996)

Thomas, Middy (1931 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Middy Thomas was born in 1931,and grew up in Damariscotta, Me He has lived in the Portland and Brunswick area most of his adult life. The stories he writes are about Maine places and people.

Selected Bibliography

Author and Illustrator

  • Marooned with Ken Thomas (1990)

Illustrator

  • The Coat by Connie Korda (1993)
  • Gooney Bird and the Room Mother by Lois Lowry (2005)
  • Gooney Bird Greene by Lois Lowry (2002)
  • Gooney Bird is so Absurd by Lois Lowry (2009)
  • Gooney, the Fabulous Lois Lowry (2007)
  • Homer with a Zipper by Jennifer Germaine Yahr (1994)

Burke, Patricia (1955 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Patricia A Burke, MSW, LCSW lives and works in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Breathe Deeply!: Healing Stories for the Soul illustrations by Viki Kennedy(1995)

Zimmerman, Ellen (1949 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Ellen Zimmerman is a psychotherapist living and writing in South Portland. She was was raised in Bath, ME, (DOB: 11-19-49) went to undergraduate and graduate school in Massachusetts, but then returned to Maine. she has lived in South Portland, on Peaks Island, and in Harpswell.

Selected Bibliography

  • Clinical Assessment of Juvenile Animal Cruelty with Shari Lewchanin (2000)
  • Community Intervention in Juvenile Animal Cruelty : a Screening and Referral Tool with Shari Lewchanin (2000)

Grierson, Ruth ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Naturalist and author Ruth Gortner Grierson is a native of New Canaan, CT and lives in Bass Harbor, ME. She has been a music teacher, plays violin in a local group, has written nature articles for newspapers since the 1980's and has written several books about the wildlife of Mount Desert Island.

Selected Bibliography

  • Nature Diary of Mt. Desert Island (1993)
  • Acadia National Park: Wildlife Watcher's Guide (1995)
  • The Wonderful Wildflowers of Mt. Desert Island (1997)
  • Living on the Edge: A Guide to Plants of the Seaside and Salt Marsh and Animals and Algae of Tide Pools (2003)
  • A is for Acadia: Mount Desert Island from A to Z (2007)

Griffiths, Thomas (1888 - 1978)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Thomas Morgan Griffiths was born in Braidwood, Illinois, was educated in the schools of Dawn, Missouri and graduated from William Jewell College in Liberty, Missouri in 1912. He earned master?s degrees from William Jewell College and Harvard University as well as a Bachelor of Divinity degree from Colgate Rochester Divinity School in Rochester, New York.

Ordained in Cambrien Baptist Church in Dawn, Missouri, Thomas Griffiths held pastorates in Dawn and Carleton, New York, before coming to Maine as minister of the Hebron Baptist Church in 1916. From Hebron, he was called to Camden, where from 1918 to 1923 he served as pastor of Camden Baptist Church.

A professor of history at Colby College in Waterville from 1923 to 1945, Griffiths also served as minister of South China Community Church for twenty-seven years, retiring in 1962. During World War II, he organized history courses taught to Army Air Force cadets at Colby; and in 1945 he taught history to V-12 Navy trainees at Bates College in Lewiston. From Bates he became principal of Monmouth Academy, retiring in 1950.

Thomas M. Griffiths served on the Standing Committee of the Maine Historical Society. He was appointed as State Historian by Governor Lewis O. Barrows in 1939 and served until 1956. (Thanks to the Maine Historic Preservation Commission for this biographical information)

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Sources in the House of the Seven Gables (1945)
  • Major General Henry Knox and the Last Heirs to Montpelier (1965)
  • a Pictorial History of the State of Maine (editor) (1970?)

Groce, Philip (1939? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Philip C. Groce is a doctor of geriatric medicine. He made the decision to move to a small, rural community to practice medicine and chose Union, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • When Mirrors Become Windows: A Textbook on How to Grow (1985)
  • Personality and the Soul: Sixteen Women Show Us the Connection (2001)
  • redefining Success: Working Close to Home (2005)

Gross, Daniel (1875 - 1945)

Genre: Poetry

Theologian and poet Daniel Irving Gross was born in Orland, ME. He attended University of Colorado (1898-99), Bowdoin College (1902), Harvard Law School (1902-1904), graduated from Andover theological Seminary in 1908 and was ordained the same year.

Selected Bibliography

  • On the Bay: And Other Poems (1924)
  • Peace I Find in Contemplation: Poems (1930)

Grumbach, Doris (1918 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Doris Grumbach was born and raised in NYC. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Washington Square College of New York University, majoring in Philosophy (B.A. 1939) and received her M.A. in medieval literature from Cornell University (1940). She served in the WAVES during WWII (1943-45), raised a family, then began a teaching career at Albany Academy for Girls (1957-60), College of Saint Rose (1960-1971) and American University (1975). She worked as literary editor for The New Republic, wrote a nonfiction column for New York Times Book Review as well as writing for other magazines.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Company She Kept (1967)
  • Coming into the End Zone (1991)
  • Extra Innings: A Memoir (1993)
  • The Ladies (1993)
  • The Magician's Girl (1993)
  • The Missing Person (1993)
  • Fifty Days of Solitude (1994)
  • The book of Knowledge: A Novel (1995)
  • Life in a Day (1996)
  • The Presence of Absence: On Prayers and an Epiphany (1998)
  • The Pleasure of Their Company (2000)

Guptill, Arthur (1891 - 1956)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Alfred Leighton Guptill was born and raised in Gorham, ME. He attended Gorham Normal School (1909) and graduated from the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, majoring in architecture (1912). He worked as a part-time teacher there until 1937. He studied at MIT (1914-1916), became a registered architect in New York (1916) and worked in free-lance advertising, commercial art, and the designing of buildings, ornamental detail and furniture. In 1919 he and George E. Bearse of Portland established Bearse and Guptill, Architectural Designers and Illustrators. In 1937, he and others founded Watson-Guptill Publications, Inc. and established the magazine Art Instruction which became American Artist in 1940. In 1951, he founded the Amateur Artists Association of America, Inc., a non-profit organization. He continued to teach drawing and art in the classroom and via a home-study course he developed.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sketching and Rendering in Pencil (1922)
  • Drawing with Pen and Ink: An a Word concrning the Brush (1930)
  • Freehand Drawing Self-Taught: With Emphasis on the Techniques of Different Media (1933)
  • Color in Sketching and Rendering (1935)
  • Sketching as a Hobby (1936)
  • Pen Drawing (1937)
  • Norman Rockwell, Illustrator (1946)
  • Pencil Drawing Step-by-Step (1949)
  • Oil Painting Step-by-Step (1953)
  • Watercolor Painting Step-by-Step (1957)
  • Color Manual for Artists (1963)

Von Vogt, Elizabeth ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Independent novelist Elizabeth Von Vogt lives with her husband in Nobleboro. She was raised in New York City where she was actively involved with the Beat writers via her older brother John Clellon Holmes. Some of her novels and her memoir are about them.

Selected bibliography

Fiction

  • The Adventures of Dorothy and Marian (2000)
  • An Awful Intimacy (2002) Winner of the Independent Literature Insitute Ulysses prize
  • Brothers Under the Skin (2003)
  • Cass Willey leaves (2005)
  • The Marriage Martyr (2001)

Memoir

  • 681 Lexington Avenue: A Beat Education in New York City 1947-1954

Selected Resources

Gutcheon, Beth ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery, Non-Fiction

Screenwriter, fiber artist and author Beth Richardson Gutcheon lives in New York City and East Blue Hill, ME. A graduate of Miss Porter's School in Farmington, Connecticut, Gutcheon went on to study at Harvard University, earning a bachelor of arts with honors in English. She is a former quilt artist and has written several screenplays. She began writing novels in the 1970's.

Selected Bibliography

  • Five Fortunes: A Novel (1998)
  • More Than You Know: A Novel (2000)
  • Leeway Cottage (2005)
  • Good-By and Amen (2008)
  • Gossip (2012)
  • Death at Breakfast (2013)

Hafford, Faye ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Faye O'Leary Hafford is an educator, a political crusader, environmentalist and volunteer, and an author who was born and raised in Allagash, ME and has lived there for most of her life. She began her 25-year teaching career in a one room schoolhouse in Allagash, and has also taught in Brunswick classrooms. She was voted one of the top 10 social studies teachers in Maine. She has also worked as a gatekeeper for North Maine Woods, the non-profit organization that oversees recreational access to the working forests of the Allagash region, and she has been an outspoken proponent for the Allagash Wilderness Waterway.

Selected Bibliography

  • Voices from Within (1991)
  • Wouldn't That Frost Ya? Tales of Michaud Farm (1995)
  • The Lady of the Rock: Tales of Cross Rock and Others: From Dawn Moirs Diaries (1997)
  • Angel of the Wilderness: And Other St. Francis Stories (1998)
  • Only God has the Right to Make Heroes: Tales of the Flood, 1991, Allagash, Maine (1999)
  • Little Boy Lost: A Salute to all American Veterans (2000)
  • The Fall of the Forest: Tales of the Last Generation (2001)
  • Where the Heck is Wheelock, Maine? Tales of St. John Plantation (2002)
  • Checkpoint Chatter: Tales of the North Maine Woods (2004)

Haines, Arthur (1971? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Arthur Haines was born and raised in the Farmington/Avon area of Maine. He has an undergraduate degree in Wildlife Managment and a master's in botany from the University of Maine; he works for the New England Wild Flower Society. He is a practitioner of Brazilian jujitsu, a rock and ice climber and teaches classes in primitive skills such as foraging and building wooden bows and arrows and flint knives. He lives in Bowdoin.

Selected Bibliography

  • Flora of Maine: A Manual for Identification of Native and Naturalized Vascular Plants of Maine (with Thomas F. Vining) (1998)
  • The Genus Viola of Maine: A Taxonomic and Ecological Reference (2001)

Selected Resources

Payne, Nancy (1910 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Nancy Payne, born March 10, 1918, has lived in Maine most of her adult life. She has been very active in civic affairs including serving the Maine Legislature during the 1979-1981 session.

Selected Bibliography

Fiction

  • Phoenix,Maine, described as "almost biographical, but the result of my years in politics and what I felt about the system, with a human interest story holding it together." (2003)

Non-Fiction

  • Widowing, a Guide to a new Life,described as "a down-to-earth,practical and positive book, very non-psychological,sentimental or religious, just girl-to-girl talk, based on my own experiences and those of many others." (1997)

Hamlin, Augustus (1829 - 1905)

Genre: Illustrator, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Augustus Choate Hamlin was born in Columbia, Maine. He graduated from Bowdoin College (1851) and from Harvard Medical School (1857). After studying in Europe for two years, he returned to Bangor to practice medicine. In April, 1861, he entered the Civil War as assistant surgeon of the Second Maine Brigade, was promoted in 1862 to brigade surgeon, and in 1863 became a medical inspector. He served in the army for the duration of the war and was entrusted with important commands in the Army of the Potomac (Medical Director) and in the Army of Western Virginia. He was afterward promoted to one of the highest positions, that of Medical Inspector, in the staff of the regular army and served with distinction in the Army of the South during the famous siege of Fort Wagner.

After his return to Bangor, Dr. Hamlin served as the Surgeon-General of Maine (1882-1886) under Gov. Robie, and is known as one of the most distinguished medical officers in New England history. He also served as Bangor's mayor ( 1879-1880). A lover of gems and minerals, he purchased the Mount Mica farm in Oxford County, Maine in order to mine the pegmatite there.

He was also an accomplished painter and made small watercolor paintings of many of his tourmaline crystals and he also exhibited a painting titled Mount Katahdin at the prestigious National Academy of Design in New York City (1859). Most of the originals of his watercolors are held in the Harvard Mineralogical Museum.

As an author, he contributed articles to the medical journals, wrote a couple of Civil War-related histories, and wrote several books about gems and minerals.

Selected Bibliography

  • Martyria; Or, Andersonville Prison (1866)
  • The Tourmaline: Its Relation as a Gem; Its Complex Nature; Its Wonderful Physical Properties (1873)
  • Leisure Hours Among the Gems (1884)
  • The History of Mount Mica of Maine, U.S.A. and Its Wonderful Deposits of Matchless Tourmalines (1895)
  • the Battle of Chancellorsville; The Attack of Stonewall Jackson and His Army Upon the Right Flank of the Army of the Potomac at Chancellorsville, Virginia, on ... (1896)
  • The Tourmaline; The History of Mount Mica of Maine, U.S.A. (2009)

Selected Resources

-The Hamlin Family Papers at the University of Maine

Hamlin, Cyrus (1811 - 1900)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Cyrus Hamlin (another of the famous Maine Hamlin family) was born and raised in Waterford, ME. He graduated from Bowdoin College (1834) and Bangor Theological Seminary (1837). In 1838, he left for Turkey as a congregational missionary. He remained in Turkey for decades and established Robert College in Istanbul, where he served as president until 1876 when, due to conflict, he left Turkey and returned to Maine. He then taught at Bangor Theological Seminary, then became president of Middlebury College in Vermont where he remained until retirement in 1885. He died in Portland, ME in 1900.

Selected Bibliography

  • Among the Turks (1877)
  • My Life and Times (1893)

Selected Resources

Haney, Eleanor (1937 - 1999)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Eleanor Humes Haney was born in Milford, DE; she moved to Maine in 1979. She received her B. A. in English from William and Mary College, her M.A. in English from Wellesley College, her M.R.E. from the Presbyterian School of Christian Education and her Ph.D. in Christian Ethics from Yale. She taught at several universities and colleges, including the University of New England, Westbrook College, Maine College of the Arts, Bangor Theological Seminary and the University of Southern Maine. Her books were on feminist theology, ecological ethics, economic justice, anti-racism and alliance building. She was a dedicated social activist who initiated or helped to initiate several groups such as the Center for Vision and Policy and MaineShare.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Feminist Legacy: The Ethics of Wilma Scott Heide and Company (1985)
  • Vision & Struggle: Meditations on Feminist Spirituality and Politics (1989)

Hankins, John (1905 - 1996)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Mr. Hankins received a doctorate in English from Yale University, New Haven, Conn., in 1929. Mr. Hankins was a professor of English at the Univesity of Kansas from 1930 to 1956. He won a Guggenheim Fellowship for 1948 to 1949 to Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass., and was a Fulbright Scholar from 1953 to 1954 at the University of Leyden, Netherlands.

He was the chair of the English department at the University of Maine, Orono, from 1956 to 1965.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Life and Works of George Turbervile (1940)
  • Shakespeare's Derived Imagery (1953)
  • Lincoln the Writer, the Development of His Literary Style (with Herbert Joseph Edwards) (1962)
  • Poems (1970)
  • Source and Meaning in Spenser's Allegory: A Study of the Faerie Queene (1971)
  • A Maine Album: Poems (1982)

Hansen, Robin ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Robin Hansen is a recognized authority on traditional mittens. She has written articles for Interweave Knits, Knitter?s, Vogue Knitting, and Knitting Now and has taught workshops from Texas to Surrey, England. Robin has a doctorate in folklore and folk life from Boston University, based on her knitting research in eastern Canada and Maine. She lives with her family and 25 sheep on a small farm in West Bath, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Fox and Geese and Fences: A Collection of Traditional Maine Mittens (1983)
  • Flying Geese & Partridge Feet: More Mittens from Up North & Down East (1986)
  • Sunny's Mittens (1990)
  • Whistling with Olives: 54+ Things to do at Dinner Besides Eating (1996)
  • Favorite Mittens: Best Traditional Mitten Patterns From Fox & Geese & Fences and Flying Geese & Partridge Feet (2005)
  • Ice Harbor Mittens (2010)

Selected Resources

Harrison, Timothy ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Timothy E. Harrison co-founded and is the editor of Lighthouse Digest Magazine and is the past president of the American Lighthouse foundation, a non-profit (which he also co-founded) dedicated to the preservation of the nation's lighthouses. In 2005, he was awarded one of the Coast Guard's highest awards given to a civilian -- the medal for Homeland Security's United States Coast Guard Meritorious Public Service Award -- for his work in saving America's lighthouses and their history. He lives in Whiting, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Lost Lighthouses: Stories and Images of America's Vanished Lighthouses (1999)
  • Endangered Lighthouses: Stories and Images of America's Disappearing Lighthouses (2001)
  • The Golden Age of American Lighthouses: A Nostalgic Look at U.S. Lights from 1850 to 1939 (2002)
  • Lighthouses of Maine: A Journey Through Time (DVD) (2003)
  • Lighthouses of the Sunrise County: Stories & Images of the People who Kept the Lighthouses in Washington County, Maine (2008)
  • Lighthouses of Bar Harbor and the Acadia Region (2009)

Selected Resources

Haskell, Robert (1938 - 2010)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Robert E. Haskell was born in Portland, ME and raised in Bath. He received his undergraduate and master's degrees (B.A and M.A.) from San Francisco State University and his Ph.D from Penn State University. He was a professor (emeritus) and chair of the Department of Social/Behavioral Sciences at the University of New England, a co-founder of the New England Institute of Cognitive Science and Evolutionary Psychology, founder of TransLearn Associates, and an associate editor of The Journal of Mind and Behavior.

Selected Bibliography

  • Adult-Child Research and Experience: Personal and Professional Legacies of a Dysfunctional Co-Dependent Family (1993)
  • Reengineering Corporate Training: Intellectual Capital and Transfer of Learning (1998)
  • Between the Lines: Unconscious Meaning in Everyday Conversation (1999)
  • Deep Listening: Uncovering the Hidden Meanings in Everyday Conversation (2001)

Hatch, Preble (1898 - 1977)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Preble Dellos Kellogg Hatch was born in Troy, ME. He attended public school in Unity, served in WWI, taught school in Aroostook County for several years, and worked as the president of a credit union in Bangor where he lived.

Selected Bibliography

  • Don't Shoot the Bill Collector (1950)
  • Homer the Handyman (1952)
  • Eat Now, Burp Later! (1968)

Selected Web Resources

Hawes, Charles (1889 - 1923)

Genre: Children's Literature

Charles Boardman Hawes was born in Clinton, NY, but his family moved to Bangor, ME when he was five. He attended Bowdoin College where he was editor of the undergraduate magazine and was class poet in his senior year. Upon graduation (1911), he was awarded the Nathaniel Hawthorne Fellowship and spent a year at Harvard. He taught at Harrisburg Academy in PA, then went to work as a member of the editorial staff of The Youth's Companion in Boston. His stories were published as serials in The Open Road, a boys' magazine, before being published later as books. He died unexpectedly in 1923 after a brief illness. He was posthumously awarded the Newbery medal in 1923 for his book The Dark Frigate.

Bibliography

  • The Mutineers: A Tale of Old Days at Sea and of Adventures in the Far East as Benjamin Lathrop Set it Down Some Sixty Years Ago (1920)
  • The Great Quest: A Romance of 1826, Wherein Are Recorded the Experiences of Josiah Woods of Topham, and of Those Others with Whom He Sailed for Cuba and the Gulf of Guinea (1921)
  • Gloucester, By Land and Sea; The Story of a New England Seacoast Town (1923)
  • The Dark Frigate: Wherein is Told the Story of Philip Marsham Who Lived in the Time of King Charles (1923)
  • Whaling (1924)

Hay, John (1915 - 2011)

Genre: Non-Fiction

John Hay was born in Ipswich, MA, raised in New York City and lived in Brewster, MA and Bremen, ME. He graduated from Harvard College in 1938. He worked as the Washington correspondent for the Charleston (SC) News and Courier, joined the Army in 1940 where he served as an editor for Yank Magazine, and was both co-founder and president of the Cape Cod Museum of Natural History. He was an ardent naturalist and wrote many books about the natural world. He died in Bremen in 2011.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Great Beach (1963) winner of the John Burroughs Medal
  • The Atlantic Shore; Human and natural History from Long Island to Labrador (1966)
  • In Defense of Nature (1969)
  • The Immortal Wilderness (1987)
  • A Beginner's Faith in Things Unseen (1995)
  • In the Company of Light (1998)
  • Mind the Gap: The Education of a Nature Writer (2004)

de Garmo, Joan (1917 - 2016)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Joan A. de Garmo was born in Stamford, Connecticut. She graduated from Stamford High School and trained as a nurse at the Greenwich Hospital School of Nursing in Greenwich, Conn. She moved to Southport, Maine in 1964.

Selected Bibliography

  • Belle Haven: The end of an Era
  • Baba: A Letter to my Grandchildren

Healy, Jeremiah (1948 - 2014)

Genre: Mystery

Mystery writer Jeremiah Healy lives in Maine in Summer, Florida in Winter, and Boston the rest of the time. He is a graduate of Rutgers College and Harvard Law School and taught as a professor at the New England School of Law for eighteen years, after which he turned to writing full time. He has written eighteen novels and over sixty short stories and has been nominated numerous times for the Shamus Award.

Selected Bibliography

John Francis Cuddy Novels

  • The Staked Goat (1987)
  • Act of God (1994)
  • Foursome: A John Cuddy Novel (1994)
  • Rescue (1995)
  • Invasion of Privacy (1997)
  • Spiral: A John Francis Cuddy Mystery (1999)
  • The Only Good Lawyer: A John Francis Cuddy Mystery (1999)

Heath, Gertrude (1859 - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet and doctor Gertrude Emma Heath was a native of Gardiner, ME. She graduated from Gardiner High School in 1877 and studied medicine one year with Dr. H. M. Potter. She graduated from Hahnemann Medical College of Chicago in 1883, and later took a special course, diseases of the eye and ear, under Dr. C. H. Vilas. She practiced in Chicago in 1883 then returned to Gardiner in 1884 to practice. She worked at the Maine Insane Hospital (Augusta) beginning in 1900.

Selected Bibliography

  • Rhymes and Jingles for a Good Child (1897)
  • The Madonna and the Christ-Child, Legends and Lyrics (1911)
  • A Son of Maine: Herbert Milton Heath (1916)
  • When All the Birds Begin to Sing (1928)

Hichens, Walter (1917 - 2007)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Walter Hichens grew up in Lynn, graduated from Lynn Classical High School and Essex Agricultural College in Massachusetts. He moved to Eliot, Maine in 1934 where he was a poultry and produce farmer for 40 years. He wrote several nonfiction books and books of poetry.

Selected Bibliography

  • Holy Land Reflections: [Poems] (1970)
  • Footsteps of Jesus: [Poems] (1973)
  • Home Spinnings: [Poems] (1976)
  • Inspirations: [Poems] (1978)
  • Island Trek (1982)
  • Back to My Father and Home (1987)
  • Light in the Darkness (1993)

Higginson, Mary (1844 - 1941)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Mary Potter Thatcher Higginson was born in Machias, ME and educated in private schools in Portland, ME and Springfield, MA. She married the noted historian and author Thomas Wentworth Higginson in 1879.

Selected Bibliography

  • Seashore and Prairie (1877)
  • Foom for One More (1879)
  • The Playmate Hours: [Poems] (1904)
  • Thomas Wentworth Higginson: The Story of His Life (1914)
  • Fugitives (1929)

Hinckley, George (1853 - 1950)

Genre: Non-Fiction

George Walter Hinckley was born and raised in Guilford, CT, attended The Guilford Institute and the Connecticut State Normal School, taught for several years in Guilford and in Kingston, RI, then became an ordained Baptist minister. He moved to Maine in 1883 and began raising money to build what would become the Good Will Hinckley School, a school for troubled boys and girls. He published for many years the Good Will Record the magazine of the Good Will Hinckley School.

Selected Bibliography

  • Some Boys I Know (19?)
  • The Story of Good Will Farm (1902?)
  • Something Happened: And Other Short Talks (1903)
  • Good Will Short Talks (1903?)
  • Daniel alexander McDonald: A Boy Who Won and the Secret of His Winning (1904)
  • Some Good Will Boys (1910)
  • Roughing it with Boys: Actual Experiences of Boys at Summer and Winter Camps in the Maine Woods (1913)
  • The Good Will Idea (1922)
  • A Long Trip at Home (1926)
  • "Camping In" (1927)
  • Ten Nights in a Bungalow (1928)
  • Fifty Years with the Good Will Record (1937)

Selected Resources

Hoar, Jay (1933 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Jay S. Hoar was born and raised in Rangeley, ME, graduated from Rangeley High School, received his B. A. in English from the University of Maine (1956), and served four years in the U. S. Navy. After the Navy, he began his teaching career, first in secondary schools, then at Maine Maritime Academy, then at the University of Maine at Farmington where he taught for 33 years.

He has published books for use in his classes as well as about the Civil War.

Selected Bibliography

  • Small-Town Motion Pictures, And Other Sketches of Franklin County, Maine (1969)
  • New England's Last Civil War Veterans (1976)
  • Callow, Brave and True: A Gospel of Civil War Youth (1999)
  • Our Eldest and Last Civil War Nurses (2001)
  • Old Dick of Lower Dallas (2003)
  • A Maine As It Gets: The Portable Professor Hoar: An Omnibus of His Adventures in Creative Nonfiction (2004)
  • The North's Last Boys in Blue: An Epic Prose Elegy: A Substudy of Sunset and Dust of the Blue and Gray (2006)
  • The South's Last Boys in Gray: An Epic Prose Elegy: A Substudy of Sunset and Dusk of the Blue and the Gray (2010)

Holden, William (1942 - )

Genre: Mystery

William C. Holden III lives in Winter Harbor, ME. He received his M.B.A. from Harvard in 1966. He has worked as a securities analyst, a financial advisor and in real estate. In 1987, he "retired" and bought a farm in Goodwins Mills, ME where he lived for 10 years raising sheep, pigs and goats and starting his writing career. He sold the farm and bought Winter Harbor Lighthouse where he lived until 2004, then moved back to the mainland.

He describes his books as "adventure mysteries with a lot of twists, turns, and wacky characters."

Selected Bibliography

  • Amawalk Horsehair: A Novel of Intrigue (1996)
  • Eastbound Four: A Novel (1997)
  • Ipdown Roses: A Novel (1997)

Hood, William (1920 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

William J. Hood was born in Waterville, ME. He attended the University of Southern Maine (1939-40) and George Washington University (1950). He worked as a reporter for the Portland Press Herald from 1939-1940 and served in the U.S. Army from 1941-45 and with the O.S.S. After the War, he served in the CIA as a station chief in Austria, Germany, Switzerland, France and England (1945-75). Upon retirement, he split his time between Scarborough, ME and New York City. He has contributed reviews and articles to newspapers and magazines including Midstream, Portland Sunday Telegram and Foreign Intelligence Literary Scene.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mole (1982)
  • Spy Wednesday: A Novel (1986)
  • Cry Spy: A Novel (1990)
  • The Sunday Spy: A Novel (1996)
  • A Look Over My Shoulder: A Life in the Central Intelligence Agency (with Richard Helms) (2003)

Hooker, Richard ( - )

Genre:

Hooper, John (1905 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

John Simpson Hooper was born in Castine, ME, moved to Auburn and attended Edward Little High School, Philips Andover Academy, Bates college, and Wesleyan University. He moved to Brattleboro, VT in 1933 and opened an independent book publishing business -- Stephen Daye Press -- named after the first man to operate a printing establishment in America. The press concentrated on non-fiction materials about northern New England, a slant also reflected in his own publications.

Selected Bibliography

  • Poetry in the New Curriculum: A Manual for Elementary Teachers (1932)
  • The Circus Boat (1939)
  • Johnny Jump Up (1939)
  • Hooper's Pasture from Maine to Vermont (1982)

Hopkins, Mary (1876 - 1960)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Mary Alden Hopkins was an American journalist, essayist, and activist. She served as editor for several leading magazines and did freelance work for literary groups including The Atlantic Monthly, The American Mercury, and The New York Times magazine. The themes of her poems and novels were about social issues, such as peace and women's suffrage. She studied at Wellesley and Columbia University.

Selected Resources

  • I've Got Your Number!: A Book of Self-Analysis (with Doris Webster) (1927)
  • The Judd Family: A Story of Cleanliness in Three Centuries (with Alice Mary Kimball) (1931)
  • Profits from Courtesy: Handbook of Business Etiquette (1937)
  • Hannah More and Her Circle (1947)
  • Dr. Johnson's Lichfield (1952)

Hormell, Orren (1879 - 1975)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Orren C.Hormell was a native of Wingate, IN and received his A.B. from Indiana State University. He also earned two masters degrees, one from Indiana and one from Harvard, where he also earned his Ph.D. (1921). He became a member of the faculty at Bowdoin in 1911 where he founded the Bureau of Municipal Research and remained for 40 years, retiring as the DeAlva Stanwood Alexander Professor of Government.

He was an early advocate of the town manager form of government and was an adviser on the development of town and city charters all over New England.

In addition to the books he wrote, he also contributed to Cyclopedia of American Government, Encyclopedia of Social Science, American Year Book, American City, National Municipal Review and Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science.

Selected Bibliography

  • Guide to the Study of the Town, City, County, State and Nation (1915)
  • Municipal Accounting and Reporting: An Address Before the Maine State Board of Trade at Lewiston, Maine March 11, 1915 (1915)
  • Sources of Municipal Revenue in Maine (1918)
  • The Direct Primary: With Special Reference to the State of Maine (1922)
  • Essentials of Government: A Study Program Prepared for the Auburn Witenagemote 91925)
  • Cost of Primaries and Elections in Maine, With special Reference to the Year 1924 (1925)
  • History of the Direct Primary in the State of Maine (1926)
  • Maine Public Utilities (1927)
  • Corrupt Practices Legislation in Maine and How it Works (1929)
  • Maine Towns (1932)
  • Governmental Control of Power Utilities in the New England States (1933)
  • Personnel Problems in Maine (1936)
  • Zoning Manual for Maine Towns (1940)
  • City Manager Governmnet in Portland, Maine
  • The Manager Plan for Maine Municipalities (with Lawrence Lee Pelletier) (1949)
  • Planning and Zoning for Maine Municipalities (1955)

Howard, Jean (1921 - 2001)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction

Jean G. Howard, an artist and author, was born in Boston in 1921. She and her husband owned and operated The Tidal Press located in Cranberry Isles, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Too Close Apart: Two Stories with Drawings (1977)
  • Half a Cage (1978)
  • Tuk the Timid: The Story of a Sea Otter - Aleutian Islands (1984)
  • Bound by the Sea: A Summer Diary (1986)

Howard, Oliver (1830 - 1909)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Oliver Otis Howard was born in Leeds, ME. He attended Bowdoin College and graduated from the U.S. Military Academy, West Point, in 1855. During the Civil War, he served as a colonel in the Third Maine Volunteers in the Union Army. He fought at bull Run, Fair Oaks (where he lost an arm), Antietam, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville and Gettysburg. He was promoted to Major General and commanded the Army of Tennessee under William T. Sherman.

After the War he was appointed as Commissioner of the Freedom Bureau to provide food and medical supplies for the former slaves.

In 1867, he established Howard University and served as its president from 1869-1874.

He returned to the Army and served in the Indian Wars, most notably in the Wallowa Valley in Washington against Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce. Then he served as superintendent at West Point (1880-1882).

After retirement from military service, he continued to campaign for improvements to the quality of education for the former slaves and their descendants in the South and founded Lincoln Memorial University in Harrogate, TN (1895).

Selected Bibliography

  • Fighting for Humanity, Or, Camp and Quarter-Deck (1898)
  • Henry in the War, Or, The Model Volunteer (1899)
  • Donald's School Days (1899)
  • My Life and Experiences Among our Hostile Indians: A Record of Personal Observations, Adventures,... (1907)
  • autobiography of Oliver Otis Howard, Major General, United States Army (1908)
  • The True Story of the Wallowa Campaign (1998)

Howell, Roger (1936 - 1989)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Roger Howell Jr. was raised in Baltimore, MD. He attended Bowdoin College where he was a Rhodes Scholar and graduated summa cum laude. He began teaching at Bowdoin in 1964, his specialty was the history of Tudor and Stuart England.

Howell became one of the youngest university presidents in the United States when he became Bowdoin's president in 1969. He served until 1978 and continued to teach and write until his death in Brunswick, ME in 1989.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sir Philip Sidney: The Shepherd Knight (1968)
  • Cromwell (1977)

Howland, H. R. ( - )

Genre:

Newstein, Holly ( - )

Genre: Horror

Holly Newstein and Ralph Bieber are both natives of PA and write horror novels together (and separately) as H. R. Howland. Newstein lives in Westbrook, ME.

In addition to the books written as H.R. Howland, Newstein has contributed stories to anthologies in her own name.

Selected Bibliography

Written as H.R. Howland

  • Ashes (2005)
  • The Epicure (2005)

Written as Holly Newstein

  • From the Borderlands: Stories of Terror and Madness (contributor) Elizabeth E. Monteleone, ed. (2003)
  • The New Dead: A Zombie Anthology (contributor) Christopher Golden, ed. (2010)

Hoxie, Evelyn (1875 - )

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, Poetry

Evelyn Hoxie was born in Canaan, ME and was raised in Pittsfield, ME. She lived in Clinton and in Detroit, ME where she served as town clerk and treasurer. She began writing verse, then (one day when her teacher daughter was have trouble finding a play suitable for her classroom) discovered she preferred writing plays.

Selected Bibliography

  • Patriotic Programs for Patriotic Days (1926)
  • Thirty-two Schoolroom Dialogues for Every Grade in School (1926)
  • When Jolly People Meet (1927)
  • John's Aunt Mehitable: A Dramatic Comedy in Three Acts (1928)
  • Hints and Ha'nts for Hallowe'en (1930)
  • It's All Over Town: A Gossip Entertainment in One Act (1930)
  • Advertising for a Husband: A Comedy in One Act (1932)

Hoyt, Elizabeth (1893 - 1980)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Elizabeth Ellis Hoyt was born in Augusta, Maine. She received her A.B. (1913) from Boston University, her A.M. (1924), and her PhD. (1925) from Radcliffe. She was on the National Industrial Conference Board for Research (1917-1921) in New York, was an instructor (1921-1923) at Wellesley College, and an Associate Professor (1925-1927) and a Professor (1927-1980) at Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Consumption of Wealth (1928)
  • Choice and the Destiny of Nations (1969)

Selected Resources

Huchthausen, Peter (1939 - 2008)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Peter Huchthausen graduated from Valley Forge Military Academy (1957) and the U.S. Naval Academy (1962). He served as a line office during the Cuban Missile Crisis, two combat tours in Vietnam commanding river patrol boats and as Chief Engineer on a destroyer, as a Soviet naval submarine analyst in Naval Intelligence, as senior American naval attache in Yugoslavia and Romania, chief of attache and human intelligence collection operations in Western Europe for the Defense Intelligence Agency, and for three years in Moscow as the senior U.S. Naval Attache to the USSR. He retired to Kennebunk and Fire Island, ME and began researching and writing. Shortly before his death, he had moved to Normandy and opened a B & B in Amfreville.

Selected Bibliography

  • Frye Island: Maine's Newest Town, a History, 1748-1998 (1998)
  • K-19: The Widowmaker: The Secret Story of the Soviet Nuclear Submarine (2002)
  • October Fury (2002)
  • America's Splendid Little Wars: A Short History of U.S. Military Engagements: 1975-2000 (2003)
  • Shadow Voyage: The Extraordinary Wartime Escape of the Legendary SS Bremen (2005)

Hunter, Terrell ( - )

Genre:

Hutchinson, Alan (1947 - 2017)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Alan E. Hutchison was born in Providence, Rhode Island, grew up in Rumford, Rhode Island and graduated from East Providence High School.

He attended the University of Maine at Orono, earning a Bachelor of Science degree in Wildlife Management (Forestry Concentration) in 1969. In 1980 he earned a Master of Science degree in Wildlife Management, also from the University of Maine at Orono.

He lived in Orono, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bird nesting islands on the Coast of Maine: A Compilation of Existing Inventories (1975)
  • Marine Wildlife Inventory of Sheepscot Bay, Maine (with Sandra J. Lovett) (1983)
  • Just Eagles (2000)
  • Just Loons: A Wildlife Watcher's Guide (2003)

Hyde, William (1885 - 1917)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

William De Witt Hyde was born in Winchendon, MA, earned his bachelor's degree from Harvard (1879), studied at Union Theological Seminary (1879-1880) and Andover Theological Seminary (1882). He served as a minister in Patterson, NJ (1883-1885), then accepted the position of (7th) Bowdoin College President (1885-1917) and professor of mental and moral philosophy.

He was a prolific writer and his books served bring nation-wide attention to Bowdoin and bolstered his reputation as an educator. He was also a trustee of Philips Academy in Exeter, NH and received honorary degrees from Bowdoin (1886, 1917), Harvard (1886), Syracuse University (1897) and Dartmouth (1909).

Selected Bibliography

  • Practical Ethics (1892)
  • God's Education of Man (1899)
  • Jesus Way: An Appreciation of the Teaching in the Synoptic Gospels (1902)
  • The College Man and the College Woman (1906)
  • From Epicurus to Christ: A Study in the Principles of Personality (1906)
  • Abba Father, or, the Religion of Everyday Life (1908)
  • The Teacher's Philosophy in and out of School (1910)
  • The Gospel of Good Will as Revealed in Contemporary Scriptures (1916)
  • The Best Man I Know: Developed Out of the Will for the Good of All (1917)
  • The Five Great Philosophies of Life (1927)

Selected Resources

Ilsley, Charles (1807 - 1887)

Genre: General Fiction

Charles Parker Ilsley was born and raised in Portland, ME. After working as a bookkeeper, he made a career change and tried his hand at newspaper work. He started The Portland Daily Times, an early one-cent newspaper, but it failed in less than a year. He then started the Portland Transcript and worked as editor there and for the Eclectic. He continued to write articles for newspapers and other periodicals throughout his life, though his name was often mis-spelled as Isley. Many of his serialized stories were compiled and published. He died in Cambridge, MA in 1887.

Selected Bibliography

  • Forest and Shore: Or, Legends of the Pine-Tree State (1856)
  • The Wrecker's Daughter: And Other Tales of the Forest, the Shore, and the Ocean (1861)

Incze, Lewis (1915? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Lewis Lajos Incze was born and raised in Parajd, Romania (Transylvania) where he trained to be an X-ray technician, served in the Hungarian Army as a translator during WWII, then worked as an interpreter in Rome. In 1949, he emigrated to the United States, settled in Lewiston, ME and eventually retired as the director of education at St. Mary's Hospital's School of Radiological Technology.

He has written throughout most of his life. He has published over 36 titles and in 1984, his book Footprints on Destiny Lane won the gold award at the 1984 Hungarian National Congress for best new historical work. He also wrote stories about travels for the Lewiston Sun Journal, Lewiston Daily Sun and the Lewiston Evening Journal for nearly 30 years.

Selected Bibliography

  • Foot Prints on Destiny Lane (1982)
  • Once Upon a Maine Island: Hell and Heaven at Sea, A Saga in Island Life (1983)
  • A Tree on Two Continents (1992)
  • Dialogue with Death (1996)
  • Fifteen Years Under Sail: From Agony to Ecstasy at Sea (1997)
  • On the Wings of Pegasus (1997)
  • English for Hungarophones and Hungarian for Anglophones (1997)
  • A Tale of Two Islands (1998)
  • Tracing Szekely Aristocracy: Adjunct to Genealogy (2006)

Ingles, James (1905 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

James Wesley Ingles was born in Dunoon, Scotland. His family moved to New York when he was 5 and he grew up in Nyack and Ossining, NY. He received his undergraduate degree from Wheaton College, his masters (with honors) from Princeton, and did his graduate study at Drew University, NJ.

He summered in Maine for many years before becoming a professor of literature at Bates College (1943) and moving to Auburn, ME.

He is best known for his novels, although he also wrote poetry, book reviews and literary criticism and at least one of his short stories, The Wind is Blind was included in the O Henry Prize Collection for 1948.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Wind is Blind [From Prize Stories of 1948: The O. Henry Awards selected and edited by Herschel Brickell] (1948)
  • A Woman of Samaria (1949)

Ingraham, Joseph (1809 - 1860)

Genre: General Fiction

Joseph Holt Ingraham was born and raised in Portland, ME where his family owned a shipyard. He shipped out on one of their ships before he was 17. Anecdotal information has him graduating from Bowdoin College, but there is no record of that. There is also anecdotal evidence of him attending Yale, but not graduating. He moved to New Orleans, then Mississippi where he became teacher at Jefferson College. He published his first novel while there (1835) and continued to write voraciously (claiming 20 novels in one year). Many of these were probably run as serials and were never collected into volumes.

In 1849, he moved to Nashville, TN to establish a school for young ladies and continued to write, including a set of letters published in the Philadelphia Saturday Courier under the guise of a New England governess residing in the South. They were meant as a defense against Uncle Tom's Cabin and were later collected into a book with the title The Sunny South.

He was ordained an Episcopal priest in 1852 and served in several churches throughout the South, continuing to write novels described as "dime novels of the Bible." He died of an accidental, self-inflicted gunshot wound at the age of 51.

Selected Bibliography

  • The American Lounger: Or, Tales, Sketches, and Legends, Gathered in Sundry Journeyings (1839)
  • Morris Graeme, Or, The Cruise of the Sea-Slipper: A Sequel to the Dancing Feather, a Tale of the Land and the Sea (1843)
  • Black Ralph, or, the Helmsman of Hurlgate: A Tale (1844)
  • The Dancing Feather (1844)
  • Montezuma, the Serf: Or, The Revolt of the Mexitili; A Tale of the Last Days of the Aztec Dynasty (1845)
  • Scarlet Feather, Or, the Young Chief of the Abenaquies: A Romance of the Wilderness of Maine (1845)
  • Captain Kyd, Or, the Wizard of the Sea: A Romance (1852)
  • Lafitte: the Pirate of the Gulf (1856)
  • Pillar of Fire, Or, Israel in Bondage (1859)
  • Will Terril, Or, the Adventures of a Young Gentleman Born in a Cellar (1860)
  • The Sunny South, Or, the Southerner at Home: Embracing Five Years' Experience of a Northern Governess in the Land of the Sugar and the Cotton (1860)
  • The Prince of the House of David, Or, Three Years in the Holy city: Being a Series of the Letters... (1860)
  • The Throne of David: From the Consegration of the Shepherd of Bethlehem, to the Rebellion... (1860)

Isaacson, Irving (1915 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Irving Isaacson is a corporate and commercial attorney who was born and raised in Auburn and lives in Lewiston, ME. He attended school in Auburn and Lewiston, received his B.A. from Bates College (1936) and his law degree from Harvard Law School (1939). He served six years in the military beginning in 1940 serving both in the U.S. and in Europe. He served as the assistant county attorney for Androscoggin County (1948-1955) and as a judge in the Auburn Municipal Court (1958-1964). He has written legal texts for the training of law enforcement personnel as well as a memoir.

Selected Bibliography

  • Manual for the Arresting Officer (1961)
  • Memoirs of an Amateur Spy: The Story of the First OSS Spy in the Cold War with the Russians (2001)

Isaacson, Philip (1924 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Philip M. Isaacson was born and raised in Lewiston, ME and lives and practices law there still. He is a graduate of Hebron Academy, Bates College and Harvard Law School and is a recipient of the honorary degrees of Doctor of Humane Letters from Bates and Doctor of Fine Arts from Bowdoin. He has practiced corporate, business, probate and real estate law in Maine for many years. His other love is architecture and he has traveled all over the world exploring and photographing iconic buildings.

Selected Bibliography

  • The American Eagle (1975)
  • Round Buildings, Square Buildings & Buildings that Wiggle Like a Fish (1988)
  • A Short Walk Around the Pyramids and Through the World of Art (1993)
  • Hyman Bloom: The Lubec Woods (2001)

Selected Resources

Ives, Edward (1925 - 2009)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Edward D. (Sandy) Ives was born in White Plains, N.Y. He served in the Marine Corps, graduated from Hamilton College (B.S. Engish and History), received his M.A. degree in medieval literature at Columbia University, and his Ph.D. in folklore from Indiana University (1962). He taught English at Illinois College (1950-1953); The City College of New York (1953-1954); the University of Maine, English and Folklore for 44 years, retiring in 1999. He was also a guest lecturer at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, and the University of Sheffield, England.

He made many important contributions to the field of folklore and oral history and founded what is now known as the Maine Folklife Center and served as its director for over 20 years. He authored or co-authored several books, published articles in scholarly journals, edited 33 volumes of Northeast Folklore, and recorded folk songs and tape recorded interviews of oral history which have been used in workshops and courses across the country. In 2006, some of these recordings were included in the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress.

Selected Bibliography

  • Larry Gorman: The Man Who Made the Songs (1964)
  • Lawrence Doyle: The Farmer-Poet of Prince Edward Island: A Study in Local Songmaking (1971)
  • Argyle Boom... (1977)
  • Joe Scott, the Woodsman-Songmaker (1978)
  • The Tape-Recorded Interview: A Manual for Field Workers in Folklore and Oran History (1980)
  • George Magoon and the Down East Game War: History, Folklore, and the Law (1988)
  • Drive Dull Care Away: Folksongs from Prince Edward Island (1999)
  • Wilmot MacDonald at the Miramichi Folksong Festival (2002)

Selected Resources

Jackson, George (1874 - 1953)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

George Pullen Jackson was born in Monson, ME and attended the Royal Conservatory of Music, Dresden, Germany (1897-98), Vanderbilt University (Ph.B. 1904 and Ph.D 1911) the University of Chicago, and did post-graduate work at University of Chicago, University of Munich, and University of Bonn. He taught German at various institutions and studied "fasola" or white spiritualist music. He was the founder and/or member of several folklore societies, founded the Nashville Symphony Orchestra, wrote articles for several scholarly journals and published several books.

Selected Bibliography

  • White Spirituals in the Southern Uplands; The Story of the Fasola Folk, Their Songs, Singings, And "Buckwheat Notes" (1933)
  • The Story of the Sacred Harp, 1844-1944: A Book of Religious Fold Song as an American Institution (1944)
  • American Folk Music: For High School and other Choral Groups
  • Another Sheaf of White Spirituals (1952)
  • Down-East Spirituals, and Others: Three Hundred Songs Supplementary to the Author's Spiritual Folk-Songs of Early America (1953)
  • Spiritual Folk-Songs of Early America: Two Hundred and Fifty Tunes and Texts with an Introduction and Notes (1953)

Selected Resources

Jacobs, Florence (1898 - 1978)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Florence Burrill Jacobs was born in East Madison, ME and began writing verse when she was only 6 years old. She graduated from East Madison High School then taught school for several years, attended Shaw's Business College (Portland), worked in the Skowhegan Farm Bureau office and at the family store. She married and remained in Madison, ME to raise her family.

She began submitting poems to various publications as a teenager and began making a career out of writing in the 1930's. Her poetry was included in many different publications, as well as Hallmark cards and gift books and her poems won several awards. She also published short stories, romances and books.

Selected Bibliography

  • Gentle Harvest: Poetic Moods and Memories of a Woman's Life (1970)
  • Neighbors: Poems (1949)
  • Stones and Other Poems (1932)

Selected Resources

Jakeman, Adelbert ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Adelbert Jakeman was born in Chelsea, MA, and summered in Alfred and Ocean Park (Old Orchard Beach), ME. He graduated from Bates College and Boston University and taught for many years in Rumford, ME, and Lexington and Whitefield MA. He retired to Ocean Park.

In addition to writing and publishing poetry, he made a study of New England covered bridges and published a book of those remaining in Connecticut and Massachusetts and later, another devoted to those in Maine. He contributed to several magazines and journals and, in 1940, co-founded the Maine Writers' Conference held at Ocean Park.

Selected Bibliography

  • Old Covered Bridges: The Story of Covered Bridges in General; With a Description of the Remaining Bridges in Massachusetts and Connecticut (1935)
  • Ritual: And Other Poems (1940)
  • Country Christmas: And Other Poems 91947)
  • Sea Haven, Selected Poems (1950)
  • The Story of Ocean Park, An Informal Seventy-Fifth Anniversary History, 1881-1956 (1956)
  • Island Visit; Poems (1963)
  • Maine: 1820-1970: new and Selected Poems (1970)
  • Sand Castle; [Poems] (1974)
  • Old Covered Bridges of Maine (1980)
  • Centennial History of Ocean Park, Maine, 1881-1981 (1981)

Upham, Thomas (1799 - 1872)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Born in New Hampshire in 1799, Thomas Cogswell Upham was appointed Professor of Mental and Moral Philosophy at Bowdoin College in 1824. He held the post until his retirement in 1867. AS a poet, philospher and psychologist, Upham explored the intersections of intellectual, sentient, and voluntary actions.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ratio Disciplinae, or, the Constitution of the Congregational Churches (1829)
  • A Philosophical and Practical Treatise on the Will (1834)
  • The Manual of Peace: Embracing I, Evils and Remedies of War, II, Suggestions on the Law of Nations, III, considerations of a Congress of Nations (1836)
  • The Manual of Peace: Exhibiting the Evils and Remedies of War (1842)
  • American Cottage Life: A Series of Poems Illustrative of American Scenery, and of the Associations, Feelings, and Employments of the American Cottager and Farmer (1850)

Johnson, Shelley (1954 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Shelley Johnson is a registered Maine Guide and a coastal kayak instructor certified by the American Canoe Association. Sea kayaking editor for Canoe & Kayak Magazine, she also is a frequent contributor to Atlantic Coastal Kayaker and Kayak Touring. Shelley has taught sea kayaking and watersports safety courses throughout the United States and Canada.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sea Kayaking (1998)
  • Guide to Sea Kayaking in Maine: The Best Day Trips and Tours from Casco Bay to Machias (2001)
  • Sea Kayaker's Pocket Guide (2002)

Jones, Augustine (1835 - 1925)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Augustine Jones was born in South China, ME and attended Friends school in Providence, RI and North Yarmouth Academy in Maine. He graduated from Bowdoin (1860) and became principal of Oak Grove Seminary in Vassalboro, ME (1860-63). He then studied law and earned the degree of LL.B. from Harvard (1867). He practiced law in Boston and served in the Massachusetts legislature (1878) then in 1879 he became the principal of the Friends school in Providence. He published several pamphlets about the Friends church and several biographies.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Life and Work of Thomas Dudley: The Second Governor of Massachusetts (1899)
  • The Two Elizabeths (1900)
  • William Bradford: A Quaker Artist (1900)
  • Joseph Dudley, Ninth Governor of Massachusetts (1916)

Judd, Richard ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Dr. Richard W. Judd is the Col. James C. McBride Professor of History as well as the chair of the History Department at the University of Maine. His field of study is environmental history, concentrating on New England. He received a Ph.D from the University of California Irvine in 1979 and first came to Maine in 1980. He also edits the Maine Historical Society's quarterly journal, Maine History.

Selected Bibliography

  • Aroostook: A Century of Logging in Northern Maine (1989)
  • Maine: The Pine Tree State from Prehistory to the Present (1995)
  • Common Lands, Common People: The Origins of Conservation in Northern New England (1997)
  • Natural States: The Environmental Imagination in Maine, Oregon, and the Nation (2003)
  • New England and the Maritime Provinces: Connections and Comparison (2005)
  • Ktaadn Trails: Lusius Merrill and the Paths to Katahdin (2005)
  • Second nature : an environmental history of New England (2014)
  • Historical Atlas of Maine with Stephen J. Hornsby (2015)
  • Finding Thoreau : the meaning of nature in the making of an environmental icon (2018)

Judd, Sylvester (1813 - 1853)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction, Poetry

Sylvester Judd was born in Westhampton, MA and raised in Northampton, MA. He attended Hopkins Academy in Hadley, MA, Yale and Harvard Divinity School. He was a Unitarian minister who was ordained at the East Parish Unitarian Church in Augusta, ME and served as minister there for many years. He was chaplain of the Maine State legislature until dismissed due to his outspoken preaching on pacifist themes which began to alienate his parishoners.

He wrote novels, plays and poetry and is considered by some to be the first transcendental novelist. His best work, the novel Margaret was described by James Russell Lowell as "the first Yankee book, with the soul of Down East..."

He was 39 at the time of his death in 1853.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Moral Review of the Revolutinary War, or Some of the Evils of the Event Considered. A Discourse... (1842)
  • The True Dignity of Politics: A Sermon (1850)
  • Philo: An Evangeliad (1850)
  • The Birthright Church: A Discourse by the Late Rev. Sylvester Judd (1853)
  • The Church In a Series of Discourses (1854)
  • Margaret: A Tale of the Real and Ideal, Blight and Bloom (1871)

Julavits, Heidi (1968 - mlb)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Heidi Julavits was born and raised in Portland, ME, attended Dartmouth College (1990), and earned her MFA from Columbia University (1996). She is an author and co-editor of The Believer magazine. She is a freelance journalist for Esquire, Harper's Bazaar, and the New York Times Magazine and she has published several novels. She splits her time between Maine and Manhattan.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Mineral Palace (2001)
  • The Effect of Living Backwards (1003)
  • Hotel Andromeda (2003)
  • The Uses of Enchantment: A Novel (2006)
  • The Vanishers (2012)
  • The Folded Clock: A Diary (2015)

Kaufman, Polly (1929 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Polly Welts Kaufman received her A.B from Brown University, Her M.A. from the University of Washington and her Ed.D. from Boston University. She has been teaching at the University of Southern Maine since 1995. Her interest is in history, particularly women's history. She has published several books, many articles, and is a regular reviewer for Choice.

Selected Bibliography

  • Women Teachers on the Frontier (1984)
  • Apron Full of Gold: The Letters of Mary Jane Megquier from San Francisco, 1849-1856 (1994)
  • A Women's History Walking Trail in Portland, Maine (1997)
  • National Parks and the Woman's Voice: A History (1998)
  • Her Past Around Us: Interpreting Sites for Women's History (2003)
  • National Parks and the Woman's Voice: A History (2006)

Kehoe, Brendan (1970 - 2011)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Brendan Patrick Kehoe was born in Dublin, Ireland and raised in China, ME. As a teen, he became interested in computers and programming and attended Widener University (PA) to study computers. While there, he wrote Zen and the Art of the Internet: A Beginner's Guide (1992) which was the first widely published guide to the Internet. A PC Magazine survey listed this book as one of the top tech books and, at Kehoe's insistence, it is freely available online.

He was a gifted programmer and worked during the 1990's in Silicon Valley.

He returned to Ireland later in his life and volunteered as IT support for the local school.

He died in Dublin in 2011 of leukemia.

Selected Bibliography

  • Zen and the Art of the Internet: A Beginner's Guide (1992)
  • Children and the Internet: A Zen Guide for Parents and Educators (1997)

Kent, Richard (1953 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Young Adult

Richard Kent is an associate professor in the Education Department of the University of Maine (Orono). He received his B.S. from the University of Southern Maine, M.A. from the University of Maine and from Middlebury College and Ph.D. from Claremont Graduate University. He is the director of the Maine Writing Project, an organization dedicated to improving writing skills at all education levels in Maine. Kent has written several books, including A Guide to Creating Student-Staffed Writing Centers, Grades 6-12, the 2006 National Book of the Year for the International Writing Centers Association, an assembly of the National Council of Teachers of English. He lives in Rumford, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Entering Weld (1981)
  • Play On! (1985)
  • The Mosquito Test (1994)
  • A Guide to Creating Student-Staffed Writing Centers, Grades 6-12 (2006)

Selected Resources

Kent, Rockwell (1882 - 1971)

Genre: General Fiction, Illustrator, Non-Fiction

Rockwell Kent was born and raised in New York, studies architecture at Columbia University and art at the New York School of Art. He was well known as a graphic artist and illustrator as well as a painter.

Although best known as an American painter, Rockwell Kent also illustrated and wrote books. His illustrations for an edition of Melville's Moby Dick helped to bring the book out of obscurity.

Though not a native Mainer (he was born and raised in NY), Kent spent several years living and working on Monhegan and developed strong ties to Maine. Many of his paintings are depictions of the island and of other sites along the Maine coast.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Jewel: A Romance of Fairyland (1917)
  • Wilderness: A Journal of Quiet Adventure in Alaska (1920)
  • Voyaging Southward from the Strait of Magellan (1924)
  • N By E (1930)
  • A Northern Christmas (1941)
  • It's Me, O Lord: The Autobiography of Rockwell Kent (1955)

Selected Resources

Kent, William (1860 - 1955)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

William Winthrop Kent was born in Bangor, ME, graduated from Philips Exeter (1878) and Harvard (1882) where he was at one time and editor of the Harvard Advocate and The Harvard Lampoon. He did extensive research into the history of rug hooking and was considered an authority on the subject.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Hooked Rug: A Record of Its Ancient Origin, Modern Development, Methods of Making, Sources of Design... (1937)
  • Rare Hooked Rugs: And Others, Both Antique and Modern, From Cooperative Sources (1941)
  • Hooked Rug Design: Showing Twenty Eight Reproductions of the Author's Own Designs, Some in Full Color... (1949)

Selected Resources

Kidder, Rushworth (1945? - 2012)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Native New Englander Dr. Rushworth M. Kidder is an honors graduate of Amherst College (1965) and received his Ph.D.in English and Comparative Literature from Columbia University (1969). He taught English for ten years at Wichita State University in Kansas, then became a columnist (Boston 1981-1983; Perspectives 1983-1990) and correspondant for The Christian Science Monitor. He founded the Institute for Global Ethics in 1990.

Selected Bibliography

  • E. E. Cummings: An Introduction to the Poetry (1979)
  • An Agenda for the 21st Century (1987)
  • Reinventing the Future: Global Goals for the 21st Century (1989)
  • In the Backyards of Our Lives and Other Essays (1992)
  • Shared Values for a Troubled World: Conversations with men and Women of Conscience (1994)
  • How Good People Make Tough Choices (1995)
  • Service-Learning and Character Education: Developing Civic Virtues and Moral Values (1996)
  • Global Values, Moral Boundaries: A Pilot Survey with William E. Loges (1997)
  • Moral Courage (2005)
  • Good Kids, Tough Choices: How Parents Can Help Their Children Do the Right Thing (2010)

Selected Resources

Kidder, Tracy (1945 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Tracy Kidder was born and raised in New York, graduated from Phillips Academy (1963), Harvard (A.B. 1967), served in the Army in Vietnam (1967-1969), and received his M.F.A. from the University of Iowa in 1974.

He is considered a "literary journalist" because of the personal voice in his writing. While at the University of Iowa, he wrote his first book which was commissioned by Atlantic Monthly and he continued writing for that magazine as a freelance through the 1970s. His second book, The Soul of a New Machine won the 1982 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Soul of a New Machine (1981)
  • House (1985)
  • Among Schoolchildren (1989)
  • Old Friends (1993)
  • Home Town (1999)
  • Mountains Beyond Mountains (2003)
  • My Detachment: A Memoir (2005)
  • Strength in What Remains (2009)
  • Good Prose: The Art of Nonfiction (2013) with Richard Todd

Kidney, Dorothy (1919 - 2001)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Dorothy Boone Kidney was born and raised in Presque Isle, ME, graduated from Presque Isle High School and, later in life, from Gorham State Teacher's College (USM). She taught school at Yarmouth, Gray and Washburn.

She is best known for writing about her life with her park ranger husband in a small cabin in the Maine woods along the Allagash Wilderness Waterway. She also wrote poetry and children's books.

At the time of her death, she was living in Washburn, ME and in Florida.

Selected Bibliography

  • Come and See (1963)
  • Away From it All (1969)
  • Portrait of Debec (1972)
  • A Home in the Wilderness: Away From it All in the Allagash Woods of Maine
  • A Time to Live (1979)
  • Wilderness Journal (1980)

Kimball, Richard ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Author, poet and photographer Richard S. Kimball lives in New Gloucester, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Funny Feeling (1988)
  • A Christmas Wrinkle (1988)
  • The Winds of Creativity: Finding Fulfillment Through Creative Act (1996)
  • Pineland's Past: The First One Hundred Years (2001)

King, Lily ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Lily King was born and raised in Massachusetts and lives in Yarmouth, ME. She graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and earned her M.A. at Syracuse University. Her first novel became a New York Times Notable Book and won a Barnes & Noble Discover Award and a Whiting Writers' Award. Her second novel was named one of the best novels of the year by the Chicago Tribune and Publishers Weekly and received the Maine Literary Award from the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Pleasing Hour: A Novel (1999)
  • The English Teacher: A Novel (2005)
  • Father of the Rain (2010)
  • Euphoria (2014) Winner of the first Kirkus prize for fiction
  • Writers and Lovers (2020)

King, Owen ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

Owen Hill is the youngest son of writers Tabitha and Stephen King and brother to writer Joe Hill. He was born and raised in Bangor, ME, attended Vassar college and received his Masters in Fine Arts from Columbia University. He has won the John Gardner Award and one of his stories was nominated for a National Magazine Award. His work has appeared in publications such as Bellingham Review, The Boston Globe, One Story, Paste Magazine and Subtropics.

He lives in New York.

Selected Bibliography

  • We're All in this Together (2005)
  • Double Feature: A Novel (2013)

Kinney, Harrison (1921 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Harrison Kinney was born in Mars Hill and grew up during the Great Depression in Easton and Houlton, ME. He attended Washington & Lee University as a journalism major, but his college career was interrupted by WWII and he served as a "ship's surgeon" on a liberty ship. He graduated from W & L in 1947, then attended Columbia University where he received his graduate degree.

He worked for The New Yorker as a "Talk of the Town" reporter, free-lanced articles to publications such as American Heritage, The Saturday Evening Post, and Collier's, to name a few. He wrote a couple of children's books, as well as a novel, worked as speech writer for IBM's senior executives and wrote an excellently reviewed biography of James Thurber. He retired to Lexington, Virginia.

Selected Bibliography

  • Lonesome Bear (1949)
  • The Last Supper of Leonardo Da Vinci, An Account of the Re-creation, by Lumen Martin Winter (1953)
  • Has Anybody Seen My Father? (1960)
  • The Kangaroo in the Attic (1960)
  • James Thurber: His Life and Times (1995)
  • The Thurber Letters: The Wit, Wisdom, and Surprising Life of James Thurber (2002)

Klein, Jonas ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Jonas Klein grew up in Newton, MA and summered in ME. He graduated from Bates College (1954) and holds an M.B.A. from the Maxwell School of Syracuse University. He worked for most of his life as a communications executive for IBM.

Selected Bibliography

  • Beloved Island: Franklin & Eleanor and the Legacy of Campobello (2000)
  • Mother Wore a Helmet: And Other Tales of Lasterday (2005)

Knowlton, William (1839 - 1926)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

William Smith Knowlton was born in East Sangerville, ME and was educated at Foxcroft Academy and Waterville College. He taught at Monson Academy for 17 years, off and on as well as in other Piscataquis County schools, practiced law for a bit, was a pastor in Monson for several years, as well as serving as representative for Piscataquis County in both houses of the state legislature.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Old Schoolmaster: Or, Forty-Five Years with the Girls and Boys (1905)
  • Modern Classics and other Poems (1912)
  • Centennial Poems and Directory of Monson, Maine (1922)

Koopman, Harry (1860 - 1937)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Harry Lyman Koopman was born in Freeport, ME and graduated from Colby College. He taught for a while, then worked as a cataloger in several large, academic libraries. He received his M.A. in 1893 from Harvard and was appointed librarian at Brown University where he remained until his retirement. He was well-known in library circles, serving as president of the American Library Association in 1928 and being an outspoken opponent of censorship.

He worked as associate editor of one of Brown's alumni magazines and wrote a regular column for the Providence Journal.

Selected Bibliography

  • Orestes: A Dramatic Sketch and Other Poems (1888)
  • The Mastery of Books: Hints on Reading and the Use of Libraries (1896)
  • Morrow-Songs, 1880-1898: [Poems] (1898)
  • At the Gates of the Century: [Poems] (1905)
  • The Librarian of the Desert: And Other Poems (1908)
  • The Booklover and His Books (1917)
  • Hesperia: An American National Poem (1919)
  • The Narrangansett Country: Glimpses of the Past (1927)

Selected Resources

Kucera, Ann (1925 - 2009)

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Ann Mackinnon Kucera was born in Toronto, Canada and attended Berkshire Community college, graduated from Mount Holyoke College, and received her master's degree in English from UMass at Amherst. She was a Mensa Society member, farmer and publisher, as well as author and poet.

Selected Bibliography

  • Poems (1995)
  • A History of Holt's Mills (1996)
  • Harp Unstrung (1999)
  • Intemperance (2000)
  • The Costume Party (2003)
  • The Sting in the Tail (2003)

LaCombe, Michael (1942 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Dr. Michael A. LaCombe graduated from the University of Rochester and Harvard Medical School and has practiced as a physician in the central ME area for over two decades.

He has published or contributed to several books dealing with medicine, medical advice and dealing with patients. He is an editor with The American Journal of Medicine and many of his stories and essays have been published in such journals as Journal of the American Medical Association, American Journal of Medicine, Hospital Practice, etc.

Selected Bibliography

  • Medicine Made Clear: House Calls from a Maine Country Doctor (1990)
  • On Being a Doctor (1995)
  • The Pocket Doctor: 500 Medical Tips You Need to Stay Healthy and Calm Your Fears (1996)
  • On Being a Doctor 2: Voices of Physicians and Patients (2000)
  • Bedside: The Art of Medicine (2010)

Langdon, Mary ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Langley, Virginia ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Lannin, Joanne ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Freelance editor and writer Joanne Lannin teaches at Bonny Eagle High School and lives in Portland, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Billie Jean King: Tennis Trailblazer (1999)
  • A History of Basketball for Girls and Women: From Bloomers to Big Leagues (2000)

Lansky, Mitch (1948 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Forest activist, columnist and author Mitch Lansky lives in Wytopitlock, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Beyond the Beauty Strip: Saving What's Left of Our Forests (1992)
  • Low Impact Forestry: Forestry as if the Future Mattered (2002)

Lapomarda, Vincent ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Fr. Vincent Lapomarda is a native of Portland, ME and is an associate professor of history at Holy Cross, a Jesuit college in Worcester, MA. He has written several books on the history of the Catholic Church and catholicism in New England and about Italian-Americans in New England.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Jesuit Heritage in New England (1977)
  • The Knights of Columbus in Massachusetts (1982)
  • The Jesuits and the Third Reich (1989)
  • The Catholic Church in the Land of the Holy Cross: A History of the Diocese of Portland, Maine (2003)
  • The Jesuits in the United States: The Italian Heritage (2004)
  • The Order of Alhambra: Its History and Its Memorials (2004)
  • A History of the Italians in the State of Maine (2010)
  • Portraits of One Hundred Catholic Women of Maine (2012)
  • The Italians in Worcester County, Massachusetts (2015)
  • Sebastian Rle (1652-1724): In Commemoration Of His Martyrdom (2017)
  • Anthony F. Ciampi (1816-1893): The Jesuit Who Saved The College Of The Holy Cross [2017]
  • A Record Of My Writing Career At The College Of The Holy Cross (2018)

Baker, Christina (1939 - 2013)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Christina Looper Baker was born in Gastonia, NC, received her BA from Furman University, her MA in teaching from Duke University and her doctorate from the Union Institute. She taught English and women's studies in the University of Maine system for 25 years and received the Presidential Outstanding Teaching Award. She was elected to Maine House of Representatives for three terms (1996-98). She was a co-sponsor of the law which requires Maine's native history and culture be taught in public schools. She was described as the "de facto leader" of the Maine Wabanaki-State Child Welfare Truth and Reconciliation Commission Communications Subcommittee. She lived in Bass Harbor, ME.

Bibliography

  • The Conversation Begins: Mothers and Daughters Talk About Living Feminism (1996)
  • In a Generous Spirit: a First-Person Biography of Myra Page (1996)

Leavitt, Robert (1865 - 1942)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Dr. Robert Greenleaf Leavitt was born and raised in Parsonsfield, ME. He attended Worcester Academy and graduated from Harvard University (1889) where he later taught botany and, in 1899, was named an assistant professor. He earned his Ph.D. in biology at Harvard (1904) and worked at the Ames Botanical Laboratory studying, doing research and collecting specimens. He also taught high school and college botany classes in Massachusetts and in New Jersey where he was the head of the biological department at the New Jersey Normal and Model Schools.

He published widely in journals such as The American Naturalist, The Botanical Gazette, Science, and the Boston Society of Natural History magazine.

He retired to his farm in Maine where he continued his research and experimentation and raised over 40 varieties of apples.

Selected Bibliography

  • Outlines of Botany for the High School Laboratory and Classroom (Based on Gray's Lessons in Botany) (1901)
  • Papers of R. G. Leavitt (1928)
  • The Forest Trees of New England (1932)

Leavitt, Sturgis (1888 - 1977)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Sturgis E. Leavitt was born in Newhall, ME, attended school at Gorham, received his B.A. (1908) and his M.A. (1913) from Bowdoin and his Ph.D. from Harvard (1917). He taught at several colleges and was a professor at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill for most of his life. He was the director of the Institute of Latin American Studies at UNC and, in 1945, received the rank of Kenan Professor of Spanish there. He was a widely recognized expert in Spanish literature and wrote and spoke extensively about the teaching of Spanish and about Pan-American international relations.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Bibliography of Peruvian Literature (1821-1919) (1922)
  • Chilean Literature: A Bibliography of Literary Criticism, Biography and Literary Controversy (1923)
  • Siete Cuentos de Vicente Blasco Ibanez (1926)
  • Hispano-American Literature in the United States, 1935: A Bibliography of Translations and Criticism (1936)
  • Some Aspects of the Grotesque in the Drama of the Siglo de Oro (1996)

Selected Resources

Ledoux, Denis (1947 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Short Stories

Denis Ledoux, author (Maine Writing Fellow 1991,1996) and educator (B.A. English, M.A. Ed.), is director of the The Memoir Network (previously The Soleil Lifestory Network). He leads a team of coaches, editors, ghostwriters, and book producers that has helped tens of thousands of people to write their personal and family stories. His Turning Memories Into Memoirs/A Handbook for Writing Lifestories (1992, 1998, 2006) is classic in the memoir-writing field and, along with his many other titles, is available in both hardcopy and electronic forms.

Selected Bibliography

  • What Became of Them: And Other Stories from FrancoAmerica (1988)
  • Mountain Dance: And Other Stories (1990)
  • Lives in Translation: An Anthology of contemporary Franco-American Writings (editor) (1991)
  • Turning Memories in Memoirs: A Handbook for Writing Lifestories (1993)
  • The Photo Scribe: A Writing Guide: How to Write the Stories Behind Your Photographs (1999)
  • The Editor's Manual: Editing Prose as a Professional (2003)

Selected Resources

Lenz, Peter ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Historian and author Peter Lenz lives in Norway, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Healing our Heritage: Columbus, Indians, Slavery and a New World Order (1992)
  • Documents of Invasion 91994)
  • Maine, Misogyny, Sex & Indians in 17th Century Witchcraft Persecutions: Including the People and Places in Maine Connected with the Salem Witch Trials (1995)
  • A Documentary Account of Native American & EuroAmerican Culture & Contact in Maine, Massachusetts, New England & Canadian Maritime (1995)
  • Voices for Freedom, Documentary Words of African (&Anglo)American Protest, Struggle, Resistance & Liberation... (1996)
  • the Fire that Time: Jews, Witches, Indians & Inquisitions Old World to New World (1996)
  • Colonial New England Slavery: (African, African-American, Indian) in Massachusetts, NH and Maine (1996)
  • there Be Witches too Many: Maine and New England in the Salem Witchcraft Persecutions: Maine, Misobyny, Sex & Indians (1999)
  • Voyages to Norumbega: & Vineland; Meta Incognita; New Founde Lande; Saguenay; Cape Breton; Sagadahock; Semeamis; Mastachusit; Nauset & Patuxet: c. 997-1620 (1999)
  • Living Among the Maine & Acadian Indian (2004)
  • Bacwoods Philosopher: The Journals of a Western Maine Thoreau, George L. "Shavey" Noyes (1863-1942) (2005)
  • Maine Tragedy: Decimation of the Maine Abenaki 1692-1725 (2007)

Letourneau, Gene (1907 - 1998)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Gene Letourneau was born in Waterville, ME, graduated from Waterville High School and Thomas College (1928). He began his adult working life as a drummer in a band in New York, but returned to Waterville to settle down. He started his writing career at the Waterville Bureau of the Portland Express, then transferred to the Waterville Sentinel. In 1930 he began writing his "Sportsmen Say" column which ran for 65 years and was also city editor for the Sentinel. He was an avid outdoorsman, hunter and fisherman and received many accolades from the Maine sportsman community, as well as honorary degrees from Colby College (1976) and Thomas College (1987).

Selected Bibliography

  • Sportsmen Say (1975)
  • America's New "Wolf" 91984)
  • Midge, My Favorite Hunting Dog (1987)

Levine, Julius (1939 - 2018)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Julius Levine grew up in Waterville, Maine, and was a graduate of Waterville High School. He earned his B.A., summa cum laude, Harvard University, J.D., cum laude, Harvard Law School,and D. Phil, at the University of Oxford (Rhodes Scholar). He has served on the School of Law faculty since 1969. Professor Levine has taught civil procedure, trusts and estates, and an advanced course in trial advocacy, and has served as director of the Trial Advocacy Program at the School of Law. He has written books on the discovery process in trials and effective forms of trial advocacy.

Selected Bibliography

  • Discovery: A comparison Between English and American Civil Discovery Law and Reform Proposals (1982)
  • Winning Trial Advocacy: How to Avoid Mistakes Made by Master Trial Lawyers (1989)

Lewis, Gerald (1929? - 2001)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Author and columnist Gerald E. Lewis was a native of Boothbay Harbor, lived and worked in Garland and owned a hunting camp in Aroostook County. He graduated from Boothbay Harbor High School in 1947 and the University of Maine in 1953. He taught high school English in Deer Isle, Hartland, Boothbay Harbor and Dexter and was a Fulbright Fellow in 1964-65, teaching in the Netherlands.

In the 1960's he wrote a column called "The Old Feller" for the Boothbay Register and in the 1970's, he wrote a column for the Bangor Daily News called "Up Here in Maine", later publishing a book of the same title, illustrated by Tim Sample.

Selected Bibliography

  • Up Here in Maine (1974)
  • My Big Buck: Outdoor Stories of Maine (1978)
  • How to Talk Yankee (1979)
  • So Long, Scout and other Stories: More Outdoor Stories of Maine (1988)

Lewisohn, James ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet James Lewisohn was born and raised in New York City, graduated from Brandeis University, received his master's from the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York (1984) and his master's of divinity from the Bangor Theological Seminary. He taught English at the University of Southern Maine in Portland and published poetry in Poetry, American Poetry Review, The Saturday Review, Chelsea, The Hudson Review, Shenandoah and other publications.

In 1974, he was convicted of killing his wife and spent several years in the Maine State Prison. He was paroled in 1984.

Selected Bibliography

  • Roslyn (1975)
  • Golgotha: Letters from Prison: Poems (1976)
  • Light at the End of the Tunnel (ed.) (1976)
  • Out of the Depths: A Book of Prison Poems (1977)
  • Lead Us Forth from Prison: Poems (1977)
  • At the Ninth Hour: A Book of Prison Poems (ed.) (1977)
  • On the Seventh Day: A Book of Prison Poems and Graphics (ed.) (1978)
  • A Morning Offering: Poetry and Prose (1979)

Ellis, Kathleen ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Kathleen Ellis is the author of five collections of poems, most recently Outer-Body Travel. In addition to the Pablo Neruda Poetry Prize from Nimrod and the Southwest Review poetry prize, she has received poetry fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and Maine Arts Commission. Poems from her manuscript, Dear Darwin, were set to music and released as a Parma Recordings CD, nominated for a 2015 Grammy Award. She teaches literature and creative writing at the University of Maine and coordinates the annual POETS/SPEAK! fest at the Bangor Public Library.

Selected Bibliography

  • The White Buffalo (1988)
  • Red Horses: Poems (1991)
  • Entering Earthquake Country (2001)
  • Vanishing Act (2007)
  • Narrow River to the North: Peoms & Prose of the Penobscot Watershed (2011)

Lincoln, Nan ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Nan Lincoln lives in Tremont and is the arts editor, as well as a feature writer and reporter for the Bar Harbor Times. She has written for Reader?s Digest, Down East, Yankee and other magazines and is a winner of the Bob Drake Award for Journalism from the Maine Press Association, as well as other state, New England, and national awards. When not writing she sings in the Maine Women?s Balkan Choir.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Summer of Cecliy (2004)
  • Cecily's Summer (2005)

Lippard, Lucy (1937 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Lucy Lippard was born in NYC, lives in Galisteo, Mexico and summers in Georgetown, ME. She received her BA from Smith College and an MA from the Institute of Fine Arts at New York University. She writes about feminism, art, politics and place, is the co-founder of Printed Matter, an art bookstore in NYC as well as several artist and activist organizations. Her art criticism has appeared in Art in America, The Village Voice, In These Times and Z Magazine. She has won several awards as well as an honorary degree from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design.

Selected Bibliography

  • Overlay: Contemporary Art and the Art of Prehistory (1983)
  • Pop Art (1985)
  • A Different War: Vietnam in Art (1990)
  • Eva Hesse (1992)
  • Partial Recall (ed.)(1992)
  • The Pink Glass Swan: Selected Essays on Feminist Art (1995)
  • The Lure of the Local: Senses of Place in a Multicentered Society (1997)
  • Permanence of memory: Maine Veterans and Civilians Remember World War II: A Public Work (1998)
  • Mixed Blessings: New Art in a Multicultural America (2000)
  • Judy Chicago (2002)
  • Maine Women: Living on the Land/Lauren Shaw (2005)

Long, John (1838 - 1915)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

John Davis Long was born in Buckfield, ME, the son of Zadoc Long. He graduated from Harvard (1857) and practiced law in both Maine and Massachusetts before joining the Massachusetts legislature where he served as speaker from 1876-1879. He was elected Governor of Massachusetts (1880-1883). He also served as the 34th Secretary of the Navy under President William McKinley.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Aeneid of Virgil (translator) (1879)
  • The Republican Party: Its History, Principles, and Polices (ed.) (1888)
  • History of the Town of Hingham, Massachusetts (1893)
  • The New American Navy (1903)
  • American of Yesterday: As Reflected in the Journal of John Davis Long (Lawrence Shaw Mayo, ed.) (1923)
  • Papers of John Davis Long, 1897-1904 (Gardner Weld Allen, ed.) (1939)

Longyear, Barry (1942 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Short Stories

Barry B. Longyear was born in 1942 in Harrisburg, PA. He quit his job as a printer in 1977 and decided to become an author though he didn't know what to write nor how to write it. He made his first sale of a short story to Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine then others he wrote appeared in Analog, Amazing, Omni, Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, Twilight Zone as well as a few non-fiction works in Writer's Digest.

He was the first writer to be awarded the Nebula Award, Hugo Award and John W. Campbell Award for best new writer in the same year.

His novella, Enemy Mine, was made into the movie of the same name.

He lives in New Sharon, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Science Fiction Writer's Workshop 1: An Introduction to Fiction Mechanics (1980)
  • Circus World (1981)
  • Elephant Song (1982)
  • The Tomorrow Testament (1983)
  • Sea of Glass (1987)
  • The God Box (1987)
  • The Homecoming (1989)
  • The Enemy Papers (1998)

Loring, Paule (1899 - 1968)

Genre: Illustrator

A Portland native, Paule S. Loring lived for most of his life in Warwick, RI. A self-taught artist, he was known for his editorial cartoons and nautical art. He published several books of his cartoons.

Selected Bibliography

  • Paule Loring's Marine Sketchbook (1964)
  • Dud Sinker, Lobsterman: Cartoons (1964)
  • Lancelot the Swordfish (with Virginia Loring) (1964)

Selected Resources

Loud, Ethel (1878 - 1957)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Ethel Godfrey Loud was a native of Bangor, ME, attended Bangor High School where she was editor of the school newspaper. She graduated with a B. L. from Smith College (1901) and worked for the Bangor Daily Commercial beginning in 1907.

Selected Bibliography

  • Potpourri: [Poems] (1940)
  • Facets: [Poems] (1946)
  • Turn the Clock Backward (1951)
  • Passing By (1952)
  • Mystery Lake (1953)

Selected Resources

Lovell, John (1861 - 1939)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

John Harvey Lovell was born and raised in Waldoboro, ME the son of a well-to-do sea captain. He was interested in natural history and graduated with a degree in science from Amherst (1882). He taught school for several years then, in 1898, when his father died and left him independently wealthy, he returned to Amherst for his Master of Arts degree (1899) then settled in the family home in Waldoboro and began a career in natural history.

His main focus was on honeybees and whether or not they could see colors and, if so, did the bees have color preferences? He identified over 32 new species of bees during his research and is credited with the discovery that bees did, indeed, see in color.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Beginnings of American Science: The First Botanist (1904)
  • The Bee Species of Maine (1908)
  • The Color Sense of the Honey-Bee: Is Conspicuousness an Advantage to Flowers? (1909)
  • The Color Sense of the Honey-Bee: Can Bees Distinguish Colors? (1910)
  • The Prosopididae of Southern Maine (1910)
  • The Color Sense of the Honey-Bee: The Pollination of Green Flowers (1912)
  • Bees Which Visit Only One Species of Flower (1912)
  • The Evolution of Flowers (1917)
  • The Flower and the Bee: Plant Life and Pollination (1918)
  • Honey Plants of North America: (North of Mexico) A Guide to the Best Locations for Beekeeping in the United States (1926)
  • Flower Odors and Their Importance to Bees: A Series of Articles (1934)
  • Pollination of the Ericaceae: Chamaedaphne and Xolisma (1935)
  • Articles on a Variety of Subjects (1936)

Lowell, Edith (1884 - 1969)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, Short Stories

Edith Lowell was a "Renaissance Woman" of sorts. She was a proficient violinist, composer, playwright and author but could also swing a hammer with the best of them, building her own studio in Gorham.

She was a native of Portland, attended several schools, including the private schools Bellow and Waynflete, and the Northeastern Institute of Musical Pedagogy. She taught music in Bar Harbor public schools and served as supervisor of music in Gorham schools.

She wrote plays, operettas and humorous monologues for radio as well as short stories.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Portrait of Mankind: A One-Act Play (1925)
  • "To a Wild Rose": A Poetic Play to be Given with Incidental Music by Edward MacDowell (1930)
  • Anton Dvorak: A Poetic Play to be Given with Incidental Music by Dvorak (1930)
  • Runaway Robots: (The Three Strange Visitors) (1931)
  • Moment Pathetique: A Poetic Play to be Given with Incidental Music by Tschaikovsky (1931)
  • Moment Musical: A Poetical Play to be Given with Incidental Music by Schubert (1931)

Luber, Philip ( - )

Genre: Mystery

Philip Luber was born and raised in Philadelphia, PA. He has degrees from Tufts and the University of Texas and works as a forensic psychologist. He lives in Concord MA and summers on Mount Desert Island in Southwest Harbor, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Forgive Us Our Sins (1994)
  • Deliver Us From Evil (1997)
  • Pray for Us Sinners (1998)

Lunt, Dudley (1891 - 1981)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Dudley Cammett Lunt was born and raised in Maine and attended Phillips Andover Academy and Yale where he trained to be an attorney. He became a member of the bar in both Maine and Delaware and practiced law in Delaware from 1924. He was the state's representative to London for gathering evidence in the New Jersey/Delaware boundary dispute.

Lunt wrote books relating to the law of Delaware as well as other subjects.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Road to the Law (1932)
  • The Bounds of Delaware (1947)
  • Thousand Acre Marsh: A Span of Remembrance (1959)
  • The River: Selections from the Journal of Henry David Thoreau (1963)
  • The Woods and the Sea: Wilderness and Seacoast Adventures in the State of Maine (1965)

MacKenzie, G. Calvin ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Cal Mackenzie holds an endowed chair as The Goldfarb Family Distinguished Professor of Government at Colby College where he has taught since 1978.

After graduating from Bowdoin cum laude with honors in government, his PhD program at Tufts University was interrupted when he was drafted into the Army for service in the Vietnam War. He later earned a PhD (1975) at Harvard University. He was appointed to the faculty at George Washington University, then he joined the faculty at Colby in 1978.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Politics of Presidential Appointments (1981)
  • Bucking the Deficit: Economic Policymaking in America (with Saranna Thornton) (1996)
  • The Irony of Reform: Roots of American Political Disenchantment (1996)
  • Innocent Until Nominated: The Breakdown of the Presidential Appointments Process (2001)
  • Scandal Proof: Do Ethics Laws Make Government Ethical? (with Michael Hafken) (2002)
  • The Liberal Hour: Washington and the Politics of Change in the 1960s (with Robert Weisbrot) (2008)

Sharpe, Philip (1903 - 1961)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Philip Burdette Sharpe, internationally known ballistics expert and author, was born in Portland. He spent most of his adult life in Pennsylvania dying there in 1961. A life longer member of the National Rifle Association, his The Rifle in america was reprinted by that organization as part of the Firearms Classics Library

Selected Bibliography

  • This handloading game 1936
  • Complete guide to handloading: a treatise on handloading for pleasure, economy, and utility multiple editions beginning in 1937
  • The Rifle in America 1938

Selected Resources

MacMillan, Miriam (1905 - 1987)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Miriam Look MacMillan was born and raised in Massachusetts. At age 30, she married her childhood hero, Donald MacMillan, the Arctic explorer and spent most of the rest of her life accompanying him on his expeditions north on the schooner Bowdoin. She was chief photographer and took copious notes during the nine expeditions in which she was involved and used these to later write books about them.

After her husband's death, she moved to Owl's Head, ME and served as the honorary curator of the Peary-MacMillan Arctic Museum (Bowdoin College) where she worked at arranging and cataloguing the thousands of photographs, slides and artifacts she and her husband brought back from the Arctic. In recognition of her accomplishments, she received the honorary degree of Sc.D. from Bowdoin College in 1980. She spent a great deal of her time in Maine working to raise money for the restoration of the schooner Bowdoin.

Selected Titles

  • Green Seas and White Ice (1948)
  • Kudla and His Polar Bear (1953)

Selected Resources

MacVane, John (1912 - 1984)

Genre: Non-Fiction

John F. MacVane was born and raised in Portland, ME. He earned a B.A. at Williams College (1933) and a B. Litt. at Exeter College, Oxford (1936). During the 1930's, he worked as a newspaper reporter for the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, the New York Sun, and the London Daily Sun. He was working for the International News Service in Paris and covered the fall of France in 1939-40, then worked for NBC as a war correspondent where he covered the North Africa campaign, Normandy on D-Day, the Dieppe raid, the liberation of Paris and the meeting of the U.S. and Russian armies on the Elbe river. He was (along with Edward R. Murrow) one of the first radio newscasters to broadcast live from London during WWII.

Post-war, he covered the UN Security Council, the Berlin Air Lift, the UN General Assembly in Paris; he was advisor to the U.S. mission to the UN, worked for ABC in NYC as producer and moderator of a weekly radio program and the weekly TV panel program United or Not.

He later worked as a weekly news commentator for WMTW-TV in Poland Spring, ME.

He died in Brunswick, ME.

Selected Titles

  • Journey Into War: War and Diplomacy in North Africa (1942)
  • On the Air in World War II (1979)

Marcus, Ben (1967 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Ben Marcus' stories, essays, and reviews have appeared in Harper's, The New Yorker, The Paris Review, The Believer, The New York Times, Salon, McSweeneys, Time, Conjunctions, Nerve, Black Clock, Grand Street, Cabinet, Parkett, The Village Voice, Poetry, and BOMB. He is the editor of The Anchor Book of New American Short Stories, and for several years he was the fiction editor of Fence. He has recently served as the guest fiction editor for Guernica Magazine. He is a 2009 recipient of a grant for Innovative Literature from the Creative Capital Foundation. In 2008 he received the Morton Dauwen Zabel Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and he has also received a Whiting Writers Award, a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in fiction, three Pushcart Prizes, and a fiction fellowship from the Howard Foundation of Brown University, where he taught for several years before joining the faculty at Columbia Universitys School of the Arts.

Selected Titles

  • The Age of Wire and String: Stories (1998)
  • The Father Costume (2002)
  • Notable American Women: A Novel (2002)
  • The Flame Alphabet (2012)

Markides, Kyriacos ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Kyriacos C. Markides was born and raised on the island of Cyprus. He received his Ph.D. from Wayne State University (1970) and has been teaching sociology at the University of Maine since the 1970's. For the last 20 years, he has been concentrating his research on Christian mystics, healers, miracle workers and monastics around the world.

Selected Titles

  • The Magus of Strovolos: The Extraordinary World of a Spiritual Healer (1985)
  • Fire in the Heart: Healers, Sages, and Mystics (1990)
  • Riding with the Lion: In Search of Mystical Christianity (1995)
  • The Mountain of Silence: A Search for Orthodox Spirituality (2001)
  • Gifts of the Desert: The Forgotten Path of Christian Spirituality (2005)
  • Inner river: a Pilgrimage to the Heart of Christian Spirituality (2012)

Marsh, Philip (1893 - 1975)

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Philip Merrill Marsh was born in Everett, MA, raised in Farmington, ME and attended Farmington High School. He earned an MFA from the University of Maine (Orono) in 1930 and an MA in English from Harvard in 1931. He was head of the English Department and taught at Houlton High School for many years.

Selected Bibliography

  • Rebel (1938)
  • Poems of a Bachelor (1939)

Selected Resources

Marshall, Ian (1933 - )

Genre: Illustrator, Non-Fiction

Artist and author Ian Marshall is a native of Edinburgh, Scotland. He earned architectural degrees at the University of Cape Town and the University of Pennsylvania. He is well known as a maritime artist.

Selected Bibliography

  • Armored Ships: The Ships, Their Settings, and the Ascendancy that they Sustained for 80 Years (1990)
  • Flying Boats: The J-Class Yachts of Aviation (2002)
  • Cruisers and La Guerre Course (2007)

Shields, Kieran ( - )

Genre: Mystery

Kieran Shields grew up in Portland, Maine. He graduated from Dartmouth College and the University of Maine School of Law. He continues to reside along the coast of Maine with his wife and two children.

Bibliography

  • The Truth of All Things (2012)
  • A Study in Revenge: An Novel (2013)

Martin, Kenneth ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

In his earlier life, Ken Martin was a college history professor and a museum director. Since then he has written or co-written more than fifteen books, most of them on maritime history. He lives on the Kennebec River two miles north of the old Gardiner Deering shipyard sites.

Selected Bibliography

  • Whalemen and Whaleships of Maine: A Publication of the Marine Research Society of Bath, Maine (1975)
  • Lobstering and the Maine Coast (with Nathan R. Lipfert) (1985)
  • The Skolfields and Their Ships: "A Singleness of Purpose" (with Erminie S. Reynolds) (1987)
  • Maine Odyssey: Good Times and Hard Times in Bath, 1936-1986 (1988)
  • "I Am Now a Soldier!": The Civil War Diaries of Lorenzo Vanderhoef (1990)
  • The Pattens of Bath: A Seagoing Dynasty (1996)

Mathews, Shailer (1863 - 1941)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Theologian, educator and author Shailer Mathews was born and raised in Portland,ME. He attended Colby College, Newton Theological Institution in Newton, MA and the University of Berlin. He taught at Colby from 1887-1894, then at the University of Chicago Divinity School where he was dean from 1908 until retiring in 1933.

He was a leader of the Social Gospel movement during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The Movement's doctrine included the interpretation of the Kingdom of God as requiring both social as well as individual salvation.

He published prolifically, including many books and hundreds of articles. His autobiography, New Faith for Old is considered to be a significant document for the history of the U.S. Social Gospel movement.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Church and the Changing Order (1907?)
  • The Gospel and the Modern Man (1910)
  • The Spiritual Interpretation of History (1927)
  • Jesus on Social Institutions (1928)
  • The Atonement and the Social Process(1930)
  • The Growth of the Idea of God (1931)
  • New Testament Times in Palestine, 175 BC - 135 AD (1933)
  • Immortality and the Cosmic Process (1933)
  • Christianity and Social Process (1934)
  • Creative Christianity (1935)
  • New Faith for Old: An Autobiography (1936)
  • The Church and the Christian (1938)

Selected Resources

Fay-LeBlanc, Gibson ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Gibson Fay-LeBlanc is a writer and teacher. His first collection of poems, Death of a Ventriloquist, was chosen by Lisa Russ Spaar for the Vassar Miller Prize and published by the University of North Texas Press in 2012.

His poems have appeared in magazines including 32 Poems, Blackbird, Guernica, Linebreak, Maine Magazine, Pleiades, Prairie Schooner, Tin House, The New Republic, Poetry Northwest, Western Humanities Review, and Verse Daily, and in the anthologies "Satellite Convulsions: Poems from Tin House" and "From the Fishouse: An Anthology of Poems that Sing, Rhyme, Resound, Syncopate, Alliterate, and Just Plain Sound Great." His articles and reviews have appeared in Boston Review, Guernica, Pleiades, Publishers Weekly, and Time Out New York. He has received awards for his poems from the Bellevue Literary Review and UC Berkeley.

With graduate degrees from UC Berkeley and Columbia University, he has taught writing and literature in public and private middle schools, high schools, and colleges in California, Vermont, New York, and Maine. In 2011 he was named one of Maine?s ?emerging leaders? by the Portland Press Herald and MaineToday Media for his work directing The Telling Room, a non-profit writing center for children and young adults, where he still occasionally teaches writing. He lives in Portland, ME with his family, serves as Poetry Editor of Maine magazine, and is at work on a novel.

Shevis, William (1914 - 2010)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Noted Maine artist, William Allen Shevis, wrote and illustrated several books about his adventures wintering in Mexico. Born in Ireland in 1914, Shevis moved to Massachusetts as a boy. He was a a founding member of Maine Coast Craftsmen, Maine Coast Artists, Haystack Mountain Craft School and Maine Art Gallery. He lectured on art and his works were displayed across the country.

Selected Bibliography

  • Stell's dream house (1994)
  • Dancing on the mountain: tales from Oaxaca (1996)
  • Sailing to an island: text and drawings (1996)
  • La ni?a roja and the twenty burros : story and illustrations (1996)
  • Stumbling into Maine and staying(2000)
  • A first-hand account of the beginning of the Haystack Mountain School of Crafts in the kingdom of Liberty, Maine (2002)
  • Here's Frank, Captain Swift ; and, A visit to Monhegan (2005)

Mathews, William (1818 - 1909)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Journalist, writer and teacher, William Mathews was born and raised in Waterville, Maine. He graduated from Colby College (1835) and Harvard Law School (1839). He was editor and publisher of the Watervillonian in 1841, then moved to Gardiner (1843) and edited and published the Yankee Blade. He taught English for 14 years (1862-75) at the University of Chicago and was one of the best-selling authors of the 1870s.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Great Conversers, and Other Essays(/cite) (1874)
  • Hours with Men and Books (1877)
  • Oratory and Orators (1879)
  • Literary Style: and Other Essays (1881)
  • Getting on in the World: Or, Hints on Success in Live (1883)
  • Words: Their Use and Abuse (1884)
  • Men, Places, and Things (1887)
  • Nugae Litterariae, Or, Brief Essays on Literary, Social, and other Themes (1896)

Maxim, Hudson (1853 - 1927)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Hudson Maxim was brother to Hiram Maxim (inventor of the machine gun) and is best known for his work on gunpowder used during WWI, although he also wrote several books and actually began his career by publishing a book on penmanship.

He was born in Orneville, ME and educated at Wesleyan Seminary in Kents Hill, ME. He moved to the United Kingdom and worked with his brother Hiram for a while, but had a falling out and returned to the United States. A good friend of his was a passenger on the Lusitania and died when Germany sunk her. He became convinced that the United States' weaponry was subpar and wrote a book about it. He devoted much of his career to developing superior gunpowders and fuses and donated many inventions to the United States government.

He died at his home in New Jersey.

Selected Bibliography

  • Defenseless America (1915)
  • Dynamite Stories and Some Interesting Facts about Explosives (1916)
  • Hudson Maxim: Reminiscences and Comments (1924)
  • The Rise of an American Inventor; Hudson Maxim's Life Story (1924)

May, Sophie ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

May, Sophie SEE: Clarke, Rebecca Sophia

McBreairty, Darrell (1949 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Author, photographer and poet Darrell McBreairty lives in Allagash, ME. He graduated from the New York Institute of Photography in New York City (1970) and received his Bachelor of University Studies in English, University of Maine at Fort Kent (1993) with honors. He writes novels, poetry and does professional photography.

Selected Bibliography

  • At Ant Ev's (1977)
  • Conversations with Ant Ev (1982)
  • Cancelled Dreams: And Other Works
  • The Passing of Martha O'Shea (2000)
  • Alcatraz Eel: The John Stadig Files (2005)

McCarthy, Bobette ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Children's author and illustrator Bobette McCarthy lives in Auburn, ME.

Selected Bibliography

Authored by McCarthy

  • Buffalo Girls (1987)
  • Ten Little Hippos (1992)
  • Dreaming (1994)
  • Happy Hiding Hippos (1994)
  • See You Later, Alligator (1995)

Illustrated by McCarthy

  • Counting Sheep to Sleep by Mary O'Brien (1992)
  • The Tantrum by Kathryn Lasky (1993)
  • The Solo by Kathryn Lasky (1994)

Selected Resources

McConkey, Sue (1911 - 2001)

Genre: Poetry

Born in Littleton, New Hampshire, poet Sue McConkey attended the A. Crosby Kennett School in Conway, New Hampshire. Most of her education came from the "school of life" as she held a variety of jobs from saleswoman to actress.

Selected Bibliography

  • The View From Douglas Hill (1957)
  • Hold Bright the Star (1963)
  • Jade Bough, White Shadows (1970)

Selected Resources

McEwen, Osceola (1902 - 2003)

Genre:

Currier McEwen was the former Dean of Medicine at N.Y.U. and was instrumental in the creation of N.Y.U. Medical School. He also was an acknowledged expert in irises, especially the Japanese and the Siberian irises.

He was born in Florida and was a native of Newark, NJ. He was a Phi Beta Kappa and magna cum laude graduate of Wesleyan University, received his medical degree in 1926 from the N.Y.U. School of Medicine and did his internship and residency at Bellevue Hospital.

He served in the U.S. Army Medical Corps during WWII attaining the rank of colonel.

He was a pioneer in the hybridization of irises, wrote many articles and some books, and won several awards.

He died in Harpswell, ME in 2003 at the age of 101.

Bibliography

  • The Japanese Iris (1990)
  • The Siberian Iris (1996)

McIntire, Marguerite (1902 - 1984)

Genre: General Fiction

Marguerite Mclntire was born in Washington, D.C. to English parents, spent her freshman year at Massachusetts State College, then transferred to Tufts for the other three years, majoring in English and theology. In 1925 she moved to Norway, Maine, as assistant to the minister in the Universalist Church; one year later, on the death of the minister, took over the church, and was ordained. After marrying, she made a career change to wife and moved to Brunswick, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Free and Clear (1939)
  • Heaven's Dooryard (1940)

Selected Resources

McKenney, Lewis (1856 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Lewis Timothy McKenney was born in Dexter, ME. He received his AM from Bates College (1885)and worked in publishing and as an educator for many years. He lived in Wellesley, MA.

Selected Bibliography

  • Memories of Maine (1934)
  • The North Woods (1936)
  • The New England People: Builders of America (1940)

Megquier, Mary Jane (1813 - 1899)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Mary Jane Megquier was born in Turner, ME and lived in Winthrop, ME until 1849 when she, her husband and a few others decided to try their luck in the California gold rush. They settled in San Francisco where she became a successful businesswoman, running a boarding house. She and her husband returned to Winthrop in 1855, but she shocked her family and common society by leaving her family and moving back to San Francisco on her own. She eventually returned to be near her children (who didn't wish to move west). A book of her letters was published and is a great resource for those researching the gold rush or what life was like for women at that time.

Bibliography

  • Apron Full of Gold: The Letters of Mary Jane Megquier from San Francisco, 1849-1856 ed. by Robert Glass Cleveland (1949)

Mehta, Ved (1934 - )

Genre:

Award-winning author Ved Mehta was born and raised in India. He lost his sight due to illness when he was a small child. In order to get an education, he moved to the United States, alone and at the age of 15, to attend the Arkansas School for the Blind (1949-52). He attended Pomona College (CA) (B.A. 1952-56), Balliol College, Oxford (B.A. 1956-59) and Harvard University (M.A. 1959-61). He lives in NYC and in Islesboro, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Face to Face, An Autobiography (1957)
  • Portrait of India (1993)
  • Rajiv Gandhi and Rama's Kingdom (1994)
  • Remembering Mr. Shawn's New Yorker: The Invisible Art of Editing (1998)
  • A Ved Mehta Reader: The Craft of the Essay (1998)
  • All for Love (2001)
  • Dark Harbor: Building House and Home on an Enchanged Island (2003)
  • The Red Letters: My Father's Enchanted Period (2004)

Merrill, George (1854 - 1929)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Born in Auburn, ME, geologist George Perkins Merrill attended the University of Maine (B.S., 1879; Ph.D., 1889), and took post-graduate courses at Wesleyan University (1879-1880) where he was also an assistant in chemistry; he also studied at Johns Hopkins (18861887).

He was the assistant curator at the National Museum, Washington, D.C. and served as professor of geology and mineralogy at George Washington University from 1893 to 1916. He was appointed head curator of the department of geology at the National Museum in 1897, and in 1922 he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences.

Bibliography

  • Stones for Building and Decoration (1891)
  • A Treatise on Rocks, Rock-Weathering, and Soils (1897)
  • The Non-Metallic Minerals (1904)
  • The Fossil Forests of Arizona (1911)
  • The First Hundred Years of American Geology (1924)

Merrill, Robin ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Poetry

Published poet Robin Merrill earned her Master's Degree, Creative Writing from Stonecoast, her Bachelor's Degree in Nautical Science, Maine Maritime Academy, served five years in the Merchant Marine and worked as a Great Lakes pilot. Recently, she has taught science and English and works as a freelance writer. She lives in Anson, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dead Reckoning: The Sailor Poems (2002)
  • Staring at the Wall (2004)
  • Laundry and Stories: Poems (2005)
  • A House of Bottles: Poems (2009)

Merry, Edwin (1905 - 2000)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Lincoln, ME native Edwin D. Merry attended Lincoln Academy (1922) and Colby College (1929). For 43 years he was a teacher in schools from Maine to Connecticut. He also was an editor and feature writer for the Wesleyan University Press in Middletown, Conn., and published short stories and poems based on his beloved Tidewater Farm in South Newcastle, Maine, in such publications as Yankee, DownEast, The Reader's Digest, Outdoor Life, The Boston Post and The National Poetry Anthology.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Reach Road and other Lightly-Traveled Trails: Poems and Photographs (1974
  • Neighborly Relations, and other Stories of Bygone Times on a Saltwater Farm (1980)

Brown, Wendy (1967 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Old Orchard Beach resident Wendy Brown was born in Ohio. She earned a B.A. in English from Eastern Kentucky University (1989) then taught English at a rural Kentucky school. She has worked as a restaurant manager, enlisted in the Army and ran a home-based business.

She has published articles in several ezines and writes regularly on her blog "Surviving the Suburbs"

She lives in the suburbs of Southern Maine with her "amazing husband, our three beautiful daughters, eight chickens, four rabbits, three ducks, two dogs, and an abnormally large, black cat named Mr. Pumpkin."

She published her first book in March of 2011.

Bibliography

  • Surviving the Apocalypse in the Suburbs: The Thrivalist's Guide to Life Without Oil (2011).

Weiss, Ernie (1931 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Ernie Weiss was born in Vienna, Austria in 1931. He is Jewish. Following the annexation of Austria to Germany, he and his brother and parents began their journey to the United States. He traveled through Yugoslavia, Italy, France, Spain, Portugal and Cuba before arriving in the United States in 1946. The family settled in New York City for one year, and then moved to Brookline, MA. He attended Brookline High School's class of '49 as a junior and senior; became a Boston University graduate in 1953 with a B.S. in Public Relations; and served in the U.S. Army from 1953-1955. He then married and had two children. He now lives in Cumberland Foreside, ME.

Bibliography

  • Out of Vienna (2009)

Michler, J. ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

J. Marsha Michler has authored 13 books on the topics of crazy quilting, jewelry, knitting, and needlearts. She has written many articles for magazines and has won quilt awards for her crazy quilts. She teaches, lectures, signs books, and shows her artwork in the New England area. She actively pursues quilting and crazy quilting, jewelry-making, fiber spinning, knitting, pottery, photography, website design, and runs two blogs. In her spare time she gardens, builds stone walls, travels, and enjoys sushi with her husband. She resides in the beautiful foothills of Southern Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Crazy Quilts by Machine (2000)
  • Crazy Quilted Heirlooms & Gifts (2001)
  • Motifs for Crazy Quilting: [Techniques for Embroidering and Embellishing Crazy Quilts] (2002)
  • The Magic of Crazy Quilting: A Complete Resource for Embellished Quilting (2003)
  • Big Book of Quilting: [Hundreds of Tips, Tricks & Techniques] (2004)
  • Crazy Quilt Decor (2005)
  • The Yarn Garden: 30+ Knits Using Plant-Based Fibers (2009)

Millay, Kathleen (1897(?) - 1943)

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Kathleen Millay, sister of the poet Edna St. Vincent Millay, was an American poet, novelist, essayist, and screen writer. She was born in Union, ME, graduated from Hartridge School, Plainfield NJ (1917) and studied at Vassar College from 1917-1920. She had worked in a war plant in NJ, but quit and applied to join the WAC's. She died before she was able to join.

Selected Bibliography

  • Wayfarer: A Novel (1926)
  • The Evergreen Tree: Poems (1927)
  • The Hermit Thrush: Poems (1929)
  • Against the Wall (1929)
  • The Beggar at the Gate: Poems (1931)

Selected Resources

Minot, John (1872 - 1941)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

John Clair Minot was born in Belgrade, ME, attended Cony High School and Bowdoin College (1896) which gave him the honorary degree of Litt.D. in 1925. He worked as an editor for the Kennebec Journal for 10 years then at Youth's Companion and the Boston Herald where he was the literary editor for 19 years. He wrote stories about Bowdoin College, poems, and book reviews and delivered hundreds of lectures in contemporary literature at Boston University where he was the first to broadcast book talks in 1922-23.

Selected Bibliography

  • Tales of Bowdoin: Some Gathered Fragments and Fancies of Undergraduate Life in the Past and Present (1901)
  • Under the Bowdoin Pines; A Second Collection of Short Stories of Life at Bowdoin College Written by Bowdoin Men (1907)
  • Bowdoin Verse: A Collection of Poems Contributed by Students and Alumni to the Undergraduate Publications of Bowdoin Within the Past Fifteen Years (1907)
  • The Best Animal Stories I Know (1929)
  • The Best Bird Stories I Know (1930)
  • The Best College Stories I Know (1931)
  • The Best Stories of Exploration I Know (1932)
  • Rhymes of Freckle Days: Ballads and Songs of the Earlier Years Which Remain Forever Brave and Bright (1934)
  • The Best Stories of Heroism I Know (1934)

Minot, Stephen (1927 - 2010)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Born in Boston MA, educator and author Stephen Minot divided his time between California and Harpswell, ME where he was a Summer resident for over 40 years. He received his A.B. from Harvard (1951) and his M.A. from the Johns Hopkins University; was awarded two fellowships by the National Endowment for the Arts; taught creative writing at several colleges, including Bowdoin College; served as Chair of the Creative Writing Department of UC Riverside from 1990-1994. During the '60's, he ran for the US Congress in Connecticut's 6th congressional district as a third-party candidate in opposition to the war in Vietnam.

Selected Bibliography

  • Three Genres: The Writing of Fiction, Poetry, and Drama (1965)
  • Crossings: Stories (1975)
  • Surviving the Flood (1981)

Mitchell, George (1933 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

George J. Mitchell was born and raised in Waterville, ME. He attended the local public schools, graduated from Bowdoin College (1954), Georgetown University Law Center (1960) and serviced in the U.S. Army Counter Intelligence Corps in Berlin, Germany (1954-1956). He was admitted to the bars of both the District of Columbia and Maine, and practiced in Portland, as well as acted as a trial attorney in the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice in Washington, D. C. (1960-1962). He was executive assistant to Senator Edmund S. Muskie (1962-1965), assistant county attorney for Cumberland County, U.S. Attorney for Maine, U.S. District Judge for Maine and appointed to the U.S. Senate in 1980 as a Democrat to replace Muskie after his resignation. He was elected to that office in his own right in 1982 and served until 1995, as Senate majority leader from 1989-1995. He was also Special Advisor to the President and the Secretary of State for Economic Initiatives in Ireland (1995-2000), chairman, Sharm el-Sheikh International Fact-Finding Committee to examine the crisis in the Middle East (2000-2001), was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1999), and appointed by President Barack Obama to serve as Special Envoy for Middle East Peace (2009 - ). For his work in Northern Ireland, he was nominated for the Nobel Prize for Peace and invested as an Honorary Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire (GBE). He also acted as Chairman of the Board of the Disney Corporation from 2004-2007 and led the Major League Baseball's investigation into the use of performance-enhancing drugs by their players (2006). He now lives in Washington, D. C.

Select Bibliography

  • Men of Zeal: A Candid Inside Story of the Iran-Contra Hearings (with William S. Cohen) (1988)
  • World on Fire: Saving an Endangered Earth (1991)
  • Not for America Alone: The Triumph of Democracy and the Fall of Communism (1997)
  • Making Peace (1999)
  • The negotiator: A Memoir (2015)

Morine, David ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

David Morine is a former vice president for land acquisition at the Nature Conservancy. He was born and raised in Massachusetts, beginning his love affair with Maine during summer camp in the 1940's. He splits his time between Lovell, ME and Great Falls, VA.

Selected Bibliography

  • Good Dirt: Confessions of a Conservationist (1990)
  • Pit Bull: Lessons from Wall Street's Champion Trader (with Martin Schwartz) (1999)
  • Vacationland: A Half Century Summering in Maine (2001)
  • Small Claims: My Little Trials in Life (2003)

Moring, John (1946 - 2002)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

John R. Moring received his education at Humboldt State University, B.S., 1968, M.S., 1970 and the University of Washington, Ph.D., 1973. He was the University of Maine, Orono, assistant leader, 1979-83, acting leader of Maine Cooperative Fishery Research Unit, 1983-85; University of Maine, Orono, assistant professor of zoology, 1979-91, Maine Cooperative Fish & Wildlife Research Unit, assistant leader for fisheries, 1985-2002, cooperating professor of marine studies, 1987-96; professor of zoology, 1991-2002.

Selected Bibliography

  • Men with Sand: Great Explorers of the North American West (1998)
  • Early American Naturalists: Exploring the American West, 1804-1900 (2002)
  • Life Between the Tides: Marine Plants and Animals of the Northeast (with Les Watling and Jill Fegley) (2003)

Morison, Samuel (1887 - 1976)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Samuel Eliot Morison was born and raised in Boston, MA and attended Noble's School at Boston, St. Paul's at Concord NH and graduated from Harvard (BA, 1908; PhD, 1912). He taught at Harvard, UC Berkeley, at Oxford, England.

He sailed in a masted ship to Spain and back in order to get the background information for his biography of Christopher Columbus -- Admiral of the Ocean Sea -- and, during WWII, he served in the US Navy in order to tell its history from the inside, by taking part in the operations and writing about them after. He served on several ships and saw action in the South Pacific, released to inactive duty in September of 1946.

He won many awards, including the Legion of Merit, for his exceptional service as historian of the Navy and President Johnson awarded him the Medal of Freedom. He also earned two Pulitzer Prizes and honorary degrees from many distinguished colleges and universities.

He died in Boston in 1976 and his ashes are buried at Northeast Harbor.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Maritime History of Massachusetts, 1783-1860 (1921)
  • Builders of the Bay Colony (1930)
  • the Development of Harvard University Since the Inauguration of President Eliot, 1869-1929 (1930)
  • The Founding of Harvard College
  • Harvard College in the Seventeenth Century (1936)
  • Admiral of the Ocean Sea: A Life of Christopher Columbus (1942)
  • History of the United States Naval Operations in World War II (1947-1962)
  • the Ropemakers of Plymouth: A History of the Plymouth Cordage Company, 1824-1949 (1950)
  • The Pilgrim Fathers: Their Significance in History (1951)
  • By Land and By Sea; Essays and Addresses (1953)
  • Christopher Columbus, Mariner (1955)
  • Strategy and Compromise (1958)
  • Builders of the Bay Colony (1958)
  • John Paul Jones: A Sailor's Biography (1959)
  • The Story of Mount Desert Island, Maine (1960)
  • The Growth of the American Republic (with Henry Steele Commager) (1962)
  • One Boy's Boston, 1887-1901 (1962)
  • The Two Ocean War: A Short History of the United States Navy in the Second World War (1963)
  • the Caribbean as Columbus Saw It (with Mauricio Obregon) (1964)
  • Vistas of History (1964)
  • Spring Tides (1965)
  • the Oxford History of the American People (1965)
  • "Old Bruin", Commodore Matthew C. Perry, 1794-1858: The American Naval Officer Who Helped Found Liberia (1967)
  • Harrison Gray Otis, 1765-1848: The Urbane Federalist 1969
  • The European Discovery of America (1971-74)
  • Samuel De Champlain, Father of New France (1972)
  • Sailor Historian: The Best of Samuel Eliot Morison (ed. by Emily Morison Beck) (1977)

Morrison, Henry (1871 - 1945)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Henry C. Morrison was born and raised in Old Town, ME. When he wasn't able to finance his own college education, the local banker and the selectmen of the town, based on his distinguished work in preparing for college, raised the money to send him to Dartmouth (BA, 1895, magna cum laude).

He began his teaching career in Milford, NH but quickly earned appointment as superintendent of schools for Portsmouth, NH, then commission of public education for the state of NH. He also lectured on school administration at Dartmouth and guest lectured at the University of Chicago, then became the superintendent of the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools.

While at the University of Chicago, he developed a method of instruction which came to be known as the "Morrison Plan" or "Morrison Method" -- a five-step general pattern in which the student must master one level before progressing to the next. It was a precursor to the "individualized instruction" and "mastery learning" educational movements of the 1970's.

He lived most of his adult life in New Hampshire and Chicago.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Practice of Teaching in the Secondary School (1931)
  • The Evolving Common School (1933)
  • Basic Principles in Education (1934)
  • The Curriculum of the Common School: From the Beginning of the Primary School to the End of the Junior College (1940)
  • American Schools: A Critical Study of Our School System (1943)

Morse, Edward (1838 - 1925)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Edward Sylvester Morse was born and raised in Portland, ME. He was expelled from every school he attended until he began attending Gould Academy in Bethel, ME.

At 16, he worked as a draftsman for the Portland Company, a company which made steam engines for trains and ships, which developed his talent for making detailed drawings, useful later for his books on zoology.

At 17, he joined the Portland Society of Natural History. In 1856, he discovered a snail in Bethel which the Boston Society of Natural History proclaimed Tympanis morsei.

In 1859, he began studying marine biology, specializing in conchology, under the direction of Louis Agassiz, chair of zoology and geology at the Lawrence Scientific School of Harvard.

In 1866 he settled in Salem, MA where he helped establish the American Naturalist magazine where he worked as editor and provided many drawings.

In 1877, he sailed to Japan where he worked as a professor at Tokyo Imperial University. He was decorated with several prestigious awards by the Japanese. Part of his collections of Japanese pottery were later bought by the Boston Museum of Fine Arts and the rest became the Morse Collection at Peabody Essex Museum in Salem where he became director in 1880.

He died in Salem at the age of 87.

Selected Bibliography

  • First Book of Zoology (1875)
  • Japanese Homes and Their Surroundings (1886)
  • Glimpses of China and Chinese Homes (1902)
  • Japan Day by Day, 1877, 1878-79, 1882-83 (1917)
  • Observations on Living Gasteropods of New England (1921)

Morse, Harold (1892 - 1977)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Harold Calvin Marston (he preferred to be called Marston) Morse was born and raised in Waterville, ME. He received his bachelors degree from Colby College (1914) and his master's and PhD from Harvard (1915, 1917 resp.). He taught at Harvard, Brown and Cornell, then went to Princeton in 1935 where he remained until his retirement in 1962.

Morse is best known for what is known as Morse Theory -- a branch of differential topology, an important component of string theory and other subjects in mathematical physics. He received many awards and honorary degrees for his work.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Calculus of Variations in the Large (1934)
  • Topological Methods in the Theory of Functions of a Complex Variable (1947)

Moser, Thomas (1935? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Thomas Moser is the owner and creator of the Thos. Moser company which makes fine handmade furniture. He left his job as a tenured professor at Bates College in 1972 to start the business.

Selected Bibliography

  • How to Build Shaker Furniture (1977)
  • Thos. Moser's Windsor Chairmaking (1982)
  • Thos. Moser's Measured Shop Drawings (2002)

Munsey, Frank (1854 - 1925)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Frank A. Munsey was born and raised on a farm in Mercer, ME. During his time working as a telegraph operator in hotel in Augusta, ME, he was exposed to people at the social level where he wanted to be. He moved to New York City and, single handedly, began publishing his own magazine called the Golden Argosy. He became very successful and with the money earned from his magazine publishing, he began to ruthlessly purchase and absorb other magazine and newspaper titles in an attempt to create a publishing monopoly along the lines of the railroads. He died in NYC in 1925, unmarried and with no children, leaving most of his $20,000,000 estate to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Mountain Cave, or, The Mystery of the Sierra Nevada (1887)
  • The Boy Broker (1910)
  • Under Fire (1910)
  • Afloat in a Great City: A Story of Strange Incidents (1910)
  • A Tragedy of Errors (1910)
  • Derringforth: [A Novel] (1910)

Naliboff, Jane ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Jane Naliboff is an amateur photographer, an author and volunteer ESL teacher who lives in Vienna, ME. Her work has been published in magazines such as Spider, Cricket, Hopscotch, Boys' Quest, Flicker and weeones.com.

Selected Bibliography

  • Kids Will Be Kids: Excellent, Tried-and-True Reasons for Thinking Twice About Having Children (Or Why You Might Want to Rent Them Out on Weekends (1997)
  • The Only One Club (2004)

Nason, Arthur (1877 - 1944)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Arthur Huntington Nason was born in Augusta Maine. He was a professor of English at NYU and served as the first director of the NYU Press.

Selected Bibliography

  • Heralds and Heraldry in Ben Jonson's Plays Masques and Entertainments (1907)
  • Talks on Theme Writing and Kindred Topics (1909)
  • Short Themes: A Freshman Manual for the First Semester (1910)
  • James Shirley, Dramatist: A Biographical and Critical Study (1915)

Nason, Emma (1845 - 1921)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Emma Huntington Nason was an American poet, author, and musical composer. She sometimes wrote under the pen-name John G. Andrews. In 1865, she graduated from the Maine Wesleyan Seminary (Kents Hill School). She lived in Augusta, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • White Sails (1888)
  • The Tower: With Legends and Lyrics (1895)
  • Hallowell Book: [Poems] (1902)
  • Old Hallowell on the Kennebec (1909)

Nielsen, Nancy ( - )

Genre: Poetry

A former high school English teacher sparked Nielsen's love of poetry. There was a long break without writing while she raised a family, but about 30 years ago, she started again. Her poems have been published in Acadia Journal, Beloit Poetry Journal, Cafe Review, Live Poet's Society and Slow Dancer.

Selected Bibliography

  • Blackberries and Dust (1984)
  • East of the Light (1984)
  • Living on Salt and Stone: Poems From Straight Bay (1984)
  • Fencing Wildness (1999)

O'Connor, Richard (1915 - 1975)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Biographer and novelist Richard O'Connor lived in Trenton, ME. He also wrote under the pen names Patrick Wayland, John Burke, and Frank Archer. He was born in LaPorte, IN and attended schools in Milwaukee, WI. He worked briefly as an actor in two Broadway plays, then as a newspaperman in Chicago, Detroit, New Orleans, Boston, Washington, Los Angeles, and New York. His book Bat Masterson was the basis for the television series (NBC, 1958-61) of the same name. His manuscripts are held by Fogler Library at the University of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sheridan, The Inevitable (1953)
  • High Jinks on the Klondike (1954)
  • Johnstown the Day the Dam Broke (1957)
  • Wild Bill Hickok (1959)
  • Pat Garrett: A Biography of the Famous Marshal and the Killer of Billy the Kid (1960)
  • Black Jack Pershing (1961)
  • Gould's Millions (1962)
  • Courtroom Warrior (1963)
  • Jack London: A Biography (1964)
  • Bret Harte: A Biography (1966)
  • The Lost Revolutionary: A Biography of John Reed (1967)
  • Ambrose Bierce: A Biography (1967)
  • Sitting Bull, War Chief of the Sioux (1968)
  • Pacific Destiny: An Informal History of the U.S. in the Far East: 1776-1968 (1969)
  • The First Hurrah: A Biography of Alfred E. Smith (1970)
  • John Steinbeck (1970)
  • Ernest Hemingway (1971)
  • Sinclair Lewis (1971)
  • Iron Wheels and Broken Men: The Railroad Barons and the Plunder of the West (1973)
  • Heywood Broun: A Biography (1975)

O'Leary, Wayne ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Wayne O'Leary is a writer in Orono, Maine, specializing in political economy. He holds a doctorate in American history and is the author of two prizewinning books.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Maine Sea Fisheries, 1830-1890: The Rise and Fall of a Native Industry (1974)
  • The Tancook Schooners: An Island and Its Boats (1994)

Fournier, Paul (1929? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Paul J. Fournier is a native Mainer with a long career in the Maine woods, starting out as a registered Maine Guide and bush pilot. For twenty years he was the public information officer for the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife. He also produced a weekly television program, Maine Fish and Wildlife, for the Maine Public Broadcasting Network. He has written and photographed extensively for a number of magazines, including Audubon, Natural History, National Geographic, Yankee, Down East, Field & Stream, and Outdoor Life, among others. He now divides his time between Maine and Florida.

Selected Bibliography

  • Tales from Misery Ridge: One Man's Adventures in the Great Outdoors (2011) (Named best Outdoor Book of 2011 by the New England Outdoor Writers Association)

Packard, Alpheus (1839 - 1905)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Alpheus Spring Packard was born and raised in Brunswick, ME and graduated from Bowdoin College (1861), received his MD from Maine Medical School (1864) and BS from Harvard (1864). In 1860, he took part in the Williams College expedition to Labrador and the again in 1864, as a part of the expedition of marine artist William Bradford.

He served as assistant surgeon of the First Maine Veteran Volunteers during the Civil War, then was the librarian and custodian of the Boston Society of Natural History (1865), curator of the Essex Institute (1866) and director of the Peabody Academy of Science (1867-1878). From 1871-1873, he was entomologist of Massachusetts and a member of the U.S. Entomological Commission form 1877-1882. He taught geology and zoology at Brown University. He gained recognition in his field, being elected to several national and international zoological societies.

Selected Bibliography

  • Record of American Entomology for the Year 1868 (ed.) (1869)
  • Guide to the Study of Insects: And a Treatise on those Injurious and Beneficial to Crops: For the Use of Colleges, Farm-schools, and Agriculturists (1870)
  • A Text-Book of Entomology: Including the Anatomy, Physiology, Embryology and Metamorphoses of Insects, for Use in Agricultural and Technical Schools and Colleges as well as by the Working Entomologist (1898)

Davis, Katharine ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Born in Summit, New Jersey, Katharine Davis grew up in Europe. She graduated from Wheaton College in 1970 Magna Cum Laude with a BA in French literature and received a Masters in Teaching from the University of NY at Albany in 1976. She is also an Associate Editor of the Potomac Review. While living in the Washington, DC area she taught French, worked at the National Gallery of Art, and raised two children. She has lived in York Harbor, Maine since 1991.

Selected Bibliography

  • Capturing Paris (2006)
  • East Hope (winner, Maine Writers and Publishers award for fiction - 2010) (2009)
  • A Slender Thread (2010)

Packard, Leonard (1872 - 1962)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Rockland native Leonard Packard graduated from Castine.Maine Normal School and Bridgewater, MA Normal School and received his B.S. from Harvard in 1904 and his A.M. from Clark University. He was the head of the Department of Geography at Teachers College of the City of Boston, MA.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Nations at Work: An Industrial and Commercial Geography (1933)
  • Nations As Neighbors with Charles P. Sinnott (1935)
  • The Nations Today: A Physical, Industrial and Commercial Geography (1939)
  • The World of Today: An Attempt to Conquer all Europe (1945)
  • Our Air-Age World: A Textbook in Global Geography with Bruce Overton and Ben Wood (1945)
  • Text-Workbook on the Geography of World War II with Bruce Overton (1946)
  • Geography of the World for High Schools with Bruce Overton and Ben D. Wood (1948)

Selected Resources

Palmer, Ralph (1914 - 2003)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Ralph Simon Palmer was born in Richmond, Maine. His family later moved to Brunswick, Maine, where Ralph attended school, graduating from high school there in 1932. He entered the University of Maine in 1933, where he majored in zoology and graduated in 1937. His B.A. honors thesis was entitled The Mammals of Maine. He entered Cornell University in 1937, completing a dissertation entitled A Behavior Study of the Common Tern, and receiving a Ph.D. in 1940. He went to Vassar College in 1942 as an instructor in zoology, becoming an assistant professor in 1947. He entered the U.S. Navy in 1943, serving overseas in the Navy?s amphibious forces and returning to the U.S. in 1945. In 1949 he was appointed a senior scientist on the staff of the New York State Museum and State Science Service. There he did zoological research for the Science Service and acted as a clearinghouse for questions on zoology for schools, colleges and other organizations. He also served as zoologist for the State Museum.

Dr. Palmer was the author of several books as well as numerous papers and articles on ornithology and mammalogy. He was also the author and editor of the five-volume Handbook of North American Birds series, the first volume of which was published in 1962.

In 1978, Dr. Palmer was appointed a research associate of the Smithsonian Institution. After his retirement, he moved to Tenants Harbor, Maine, where he continued to work for the Smithsonian part-time. In 1981, he was appointed a faculty associate in zoology and forest resources at the University of Maine in Orono. He received an honorary doctorate from the University of Maine at Machias in 1994.

Dr. Palmer was known for the extent and depth of his knowledge and interests, which included birds, mammals, Native Americans, geology, natural history, art and photography. He maintained and indexed a large group of articles on natural history, as well as a collection of rare books on the Maine woods, Native Americans, and 19th century exploring. He also had a meticulously documented mammal collection of approximately 1,700 specimens.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Mammals of Maine (1937)
  • Maine Birds (1949)
  • The Mammal Guide: Mammals of North America North of Mexico (1954)
  • Handbook of North American Birds (1962-)

Selected Resources

Parnall, Peter (1936 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Peter Parnall was born in Syracuse, NY and raised in Willow Springs, a town in the Mojave Desert. He attended Cornell for a short while, then attended the Pratt Institute studying art for two years. He worked as a free-lance advertiser, then shifted gears and began illustrating and writing children's books.

Selected Bibliography

  • Annie and the Old One by Miska Miles (1971)
  • A Dog's Book of Birds (1977)
  • The Way to Start a Day by Byrd Baylor (1978) A Caldecott Honor Book
  • Your Own Best Secret Place by Byrd Baylor (1979)
  • The Daywatchers (1984)
  • Winter Barn (1986)
  • Cat Will Rhyme with Hat: A Book of Poems compiled by Jean Chapman (1986)
  • Knee-Deep in Thunder by Sheila Moon (1986)
  • Hawk, I'm Your Brother by Byrd Baylor (1986) a Caldecott Honor Book
  • Apple Tree (1987)
  • Feet! (1988)
  • Cats from Away (1989)
  • Quiet (1989)
  • Woodpile (1990)
  • The Rock (1991)
  • Marsh Cat (1991)
  • Stuffer (1992)
  • Water Pup (1993)
  • Spaces (1993)
  • The Table Where Rich People Sit by Byrd Baylor (1994)
  • The Other Way to Listen by Byrd Baylor (1997)

Patterson, Arthur (1888 - 1946)

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Mystery, Short Stories

Arthur Willis Patterson was born in Bristol, NH and lived in Castine, ME where he practiced law and sat as a judge. He wrote short mystery stories, novels and historical novels.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Heaviest Pipe (1921)
  • Redcoats at Castine (1938)

Sturgis, Brenda (1962 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Poetry

Brenda Reeves Sturgis was born and raised in Maine, graduating from Westbrook High School in 1980. She served in the U.S. Air Force, stationed in Aviano Italy, married in 1981 and raised four children before beginning her writing career in 2004. She lives on a lake in Shapleigh, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • 10 Turkeys in the Road (2011)

Payson, Harold (1928 - 2011)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Harold H. "Dynamite" Payson was born in Rockland, ME and received his nickname from one of his older sister's boyfriends who said he kept "popping up like a stick of dynamite." He served in the U.S. Navy during WWII, then returned to Maine, worked as a fisherman and in several boat yards, then began building boats and writing in his shop, built by he and his father in 1952.

He had a long relationship with WoodenBoat magazine which published several of his books on boat building and sharpening tools. His books became the "go to" books for beginner boat builders.

He lived for many years in South Thomaston, ME and died in 2011.

Selected Bibliography

  • Instant Boats (1979)
  • How to Build the Gloucester Light Dory (1982)
  • Go Build Your Own Boat! (1983)
  • Keep the Cutting Edge: Setting and Sharpening Hand and Power Saws (1983)
  • Build the New Instant Boats (1984)
  • Build the Instant Catboat (1986)
  • Boat Modeling the Easy Way: A Scratch Builder's Guide (1993)
  • The Dory Model Book (1997)

Selected Resources

Stafford, Marie (1893 - 1978)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Marie Ahnighito Peary Stafford was born in Greenland, the daughter of Rear Admiral Robert E. Peary and his wife Josephine. She was nicknamed "Snow Baby" by the natives who had never before seen a blonde, blue-eyed baby. She grew up partly in the Arctic and partly on Eagle Island off the coast of Maine. During WWII, she served on the Danish-American Commission which stabilized the dollar and established security for Denmark and Greenland. She was awarded a medal by the Danish government for her contributions and also the Henry B. Bryant medal for her contributions to geographical information. She also held an honorary Master of Arts degree from Bowdoin College. She lived in Bowdoin until her death.

Selected Bibliography

Books by Marie A. P. Stafford

  • Little Tooktoo: The Story of Santa Claus' Youngest Reindeer (1930)
  • The Snowbaby's Own Story (1934)
  • Discoverer of the North Pole: The Story of Robert E. Peary (1959)

Books About Marie A. P. Stafford

  • The Snow Baby: A True Story with True Pictures by Josephine Diebitsch Peary (1901)
  • Snow Baby: The Arctic Childhood of Admiral Robert E. Peary's Daring Daughter by Katherine Kirkpatrick (2007)

Selected Resources

Pettengill, Olin (1907 - 2001)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Olin Sewall Pettingill was born in Belgrade, ME, attended Bowdoin College, the University of Michigan and Cornell University. He taught at Carleton College, University of Michigan Biological Station and was Director of the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. He was an eminent ornithologist and cinematographer know for his film work with Walt Disney on the Academy Award-winning The Vanishing Prairie as well as several films of his own including works on the albatross, and the penguins of the Falklands. He Received the Ludlow Griscom Award in 1982, Cornell's Arthur A. Allen Medal in 1974, the Eisenmann Medal in 1985 and held three honorary doctorates in science.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Laboratory and Field Manual of Ornithology (1946)
  • A Guide to Bird Finding West of the Mississippi (1953)
  • Enjoying Maine Birds: An Aid to Finding, Studying, and Attracting Birds in Maine (1960)

Cinematography

  • Nature's Half Acre (1951)
  • Water Birds (1952)
  • The Vanishing Prairie (1954)
  • Islands of the Sea

Philbrick, W. (1951 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Mystery, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Young Adult

Rodman Philbrick was born in Boston, MA and grew up along the coast of New England where he has worked as a longshoreman and a boat builder. He writes books for children and adults under his own name and several pen names, including William R. Dantz and Chris Jordan. He and his wife, author Lynn Harnett collaborated on several books for children. One of his books, Freak the Mighty was the basis of the Golden Globe-nominated film The Mighty (1998) and his book for young readers The Mostly True Adventures of Homer P. Figg has been adapted for the stage at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. He divides his time between Kittery, ME and Marathon, FL.

Selected Bibliography

Written as W.R. Philbrick

The J. D. Hawkins Mystery Series

  • Shadow Kills
  • Ice for the Eskimo
  • Paint it Black
  • Walk on the Water

The T.D. Stash Crime Adventure Series

  • The Neon Flamingo
  • The Crystal Blue Persuasion
  • Tough Enough

Written as William R. Dantz

  • Pulse
  • The Seventh Sleeper
  • Hunger
  • Nine Levels Down

Written with Lynn Harnett

  • The House on Cherry Street: The Haunting, the Horror, the Final Nightmare
  • The Werewolf Chronicles: Night Creature, Children of the Wolf, The Wereing
  • Visitors: Strange Invaders, Things, Brain Stealers
  • Abduction

Writing as Chris Jordan

  • Taken
  • Torn
  • Trapped

Books for Young Adults

  • The Last Book in the Universe
  • The Young Man and the Sea
  • The Journal of Douglas Allen Deeds
  • REM World
  • Freak the Mighty
  • The Fire Pony
  • Max the Mighty

Harnett, Lynn (1950 - 2012)

Genre: Young Adult

Journalist and author Lynn Harnett was born in Brooklyn and raised in East Meadow, NY. She graduated from SUNY Oneonta with a degree in Literature (1972). She worked as a freelance writer for the Newburyport Daily News and Hampton Union; as an editor and photojournalist for the Exeter Newsletter, as assistant editor for *Business Digest, as assistant editor and editor for New Hampshire Profiles, as editor and co-founder of Kidwriters' Monthly, and as Arts & Entertainment Editor for the Portland Press Herald. She published ten books for young readers with Scholastic, Inc. and also worked as a book reviewer, publishing reviews in print as well as on the Web. She split her time between Kittery, ME and Marathon, FL.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Final Nightmare (1995)
  • The Horror (1995)
  • The Haunting (1995)
  • Night Creature (1996)
  • Abduction (1998)

Piel, Stobie ( - )

Genre: Romance Novel, Science Fiction/Fantasy

Romance author Stobie Piel grew up in Abbott Village and lives in Woolwich, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Dawn Star (1996)
  • Flights of Angels (1996)
  • Trick or Treat (1997)
  • A Brighter Dawn (1997)
  • Molly in the Middle (1997)
  • A Patriot's Heart (1998)
  • The Midnight Moon (1998)
  • The Magic of Christmas (1998)
  • The White Sun (1999)
  • Free Falling (1999)
  • Blue-Eyed Bandit (2000)
  • Renegade (2001)
  • Lord of the Dark Sun (2002)
  • The Renegade's Heart (2002)
  • Strange Brews (2005)
  • Prince of Ice (2006)

Pingree, Rochelle (1955 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Chellie Johnson was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in 1955, the youngest of four children. Her father, Harry, worked in advertising and her mother, Dorothy, was a nurse. Chellie moved to Maine as a teenager, attended the University of Southern Maine, and graduated from the College of the Atlantic, in Bar Harbor. After college, she moved to North Haven, an island town of 350 people twelve miles off the coast of Rockland, to raise her family and make a living. Right after college, Chellie and her husband, Charlie, spent several years running a small farm and selling produce locally. In 1981, she started North Island Yarn, a cottage industry of local knitters, with a retail store on the island. The business expanded quickly, becoming North Island Designs, and employed as many as ten local workers in peak seasons. The business sold knitting kits and pattern books nationwide through 500 retail stores and 100,000 mail order catalogues. While in business, Chellie wrote several knitting books. She sold the business in 1993. Chellie was elected to the Maine State Senate in 1992, representing Knox County. In 1996, Chellie was chosen by her peers to be the Maine Senate Majority Leader. She helped lead the Senate for four more years, until leaving office due to term limits. From 2003 to 2007, Chellie served as the National President and CEO of Common Cause, a non-partisan citizen activist group. In 2008 Chellie was elected to Congress from Maine?s 1st Congressional District?the first woman elected to Congress from that District.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Island Classics: Living and Knitting on a Maine Island (1988)
  • Maine Island Kids: Sweaters and Stories from Offshore: 20 Knitting Patterns from North Island Designs (1989)
  • Sweaters from Maine Islands: 16 Knitting Patterns from North Island Designs (1991)
  • North Island Designs 4: 16 New Patterns from Talented Maine Designers (1992)
  • North Island Designs 5: A Scrapbook of Sweaters from a Maine Island: 16 New Patterns from North Island Designs (1992)
  • From the Land: Maine Farms at Work (written with Bridget Besaw) (2010)

Piston, Walter (1894 - 1976)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Walter Piston was born in Rockland, ME and moved with his family to Boston in 1905. He graduated from Harvard (1924)and studied in Paris (1925-26) and taught music at Harvard from 1926 until his retirement in 1960. He was a noted composer, writing symphonies and other pieces commissioned by the Boston Symphony Orchestra and CBS. He earned Pulitzers for his Symphonies Nos. 3 and 7, and three New York Music Critic's Circle Awards for his Symphony no. 2, Viola Concerto, and String Quartet No. 5 as well as eight honorary doctorates. He was elected to the American Institute and Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He died at his home in Massachusetts in 1976.

Selected Bibliography

  • Principles of Harmonic Analysis (1933)
  • Harmony (1941)
  • Counterpoint (1947)
  • Orchestration (1955)

Plummer, Edward (1863 - 1932)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Edward C. Plummer was born in Freeport, ME, and grew up in Bath, where he worked in the shipyards to pay his way through school. He graduated from Bowdoin (1887; A.M., 1890), worked as a newspaperman in Bath, then in 1898 began to practice law and enlisted in the U.S. Navy, commissioned as an assistant paymaster. From 1921, he was a member of the U. S. Shipping Board, vice-president from 1923.

Selected Bibliography

  • Souvenir of Three Hundredth Anniversary of American Shipbuilding: Bath, Maine, August 5-9, 1907 (1907)
  • Reminiscences of a Yarmouth Schoolboy (1926)
  • Shipping Sense: a Compilation of Certain Addresses (1926)
  • True Tales of the Sea, 1864-1898 (1930)
  • Ancient Augusta: a Novel from History (1932)
  • The Edward Clarence Plummer History of Bath, Maine (1936)

Pollack, Elisabeth (1921 - 2012)

Genre: Mystery

Elisabeth Pollack was born in Sharon, Connecticut, grew up in Millerton, NY, graduated from Millerton High School and attended Cornell University, She lived in Paris, ME.

She was an avid outdoors woman, farmer, writer, naturalist, canoer, hiker, gardener and animal lover. Elisabeth began her writing career at the age of 70, after many years of running a farm and apple orchard. She is the author of two books, both mysteries set in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Rowantree Crop (1996)
  • The Gathering (1997)

Lowry, Amy (1957 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Artist and children's author Amy Lowry was born in Cincinnati, OH and received her B.A. from the University of Vermont in 1979. She has worked in advertising, gallery management, a free-lance model and in a print-making studio. She spent several years in China studying with local artists and learning the art of ink and gouache on rice paper. She credits this as having a major influence on her later work. She has written and illustrated several children's books using the name Amy Lowry Poole. She splits her time between Chicago and Camden, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • How the Rooster got his Crown (1999)
  • The Ant and the Grasshopper (2000)
  • The Pea Blossom (2005)

Potholm, Christian (1940 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Christian Potholm lives in Harpswell, ME. He received his A.B. from Bowdoin College and his M.A, M.A.L.D., Ph.D. from Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy.

Mr. Potholm is Professor of Government with teaching specialties in Maine Politics, Warfare, African Politics and international conflict at Bowdoin College. He previously taught at Vassar, Dartmouth, and the College of the Virgin Islands, and has made frequent trips to Europe, Maine Dynamics CoverAfrica and the Caribbean.

Potholm also owns The Potholm Group, a research firm which specializes in public opinion sampling and polling.

Selected Bibliography

  • Swaziland: the Dynamics of Political Modernization (1972)
  • Just Do It: Political Participation in the 1990s (1993)
  • An Insider's Guide to Maine Politics, 1946-1996 (1998)
  • The Delights of Democracy: the Triumph of American Politics (2002)
  • This Splendid Game: Maine Campaigns and Elections, 1940-2002 (2003)
  • Maine: the Dynamics of Political Change (2006)
  • Winning at War: Seven Keys to Military Victory throughout History (2010)
  • Maine: an Annotated Bibliography (2012)

Pottle, Frederick (1897 - 1987)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Frederick A. Pottle was born in Lovell, ME, graduated from Colby College in 1917 and received his Ph.D from Yale in 1925. He served as an orderly with Evacuation Hospital no. 8 during WWI, 1917-18. He taught at Yale from 1925 through 1966, from 1930 as a full professor. He was known as the foremost authority on the 18th century English biographer James Boswell, the study of whom his entire scholarly career was based.

Selected Bibliography

  • A New Portrait of James Boswell (1927)
  • Stretchers: the Story of a Hospital Unit on the Western Front (1929)
  • the Literary Career of James Boswell: Being the Bibliographical Materials for a Life of Boswell (1929)
  • The Private Papers of James Boswell, from Malahide Castle: In the Collection of Lt.Colonel Ralph H. Isham (1931)
  • Boswell's Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D. (1936)
  • Bowell and the Girl from Botany Bay (1937)
  • The Idiom of Poetry (1941)
  • Boswell's London Journal, 1762-1763 (1950)
  • Boswell on the Grand Tour: Germany and Switzerland, 1764 (1953)
  • Boswell on the Grand Tour: Italy, Corsica, and France, 1765-1766
  • Boswell in Search of a Wife, 1766-1769 (1956)
  • Boswell for the Defence, 1769-1774 (1959)
  • Boswell: the Ominous Years, 1774-1776 (1963)
  • James Boswell: the Earlier Years, 1740-1769 (1966)

Preston, John (1945 - 1994)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

John Preston was a writer and editor of fiction and nonfiction, mostly about gay life and gay issues and was a pioneer in the early gay rights movement. He authored more than 25 acclaimed books of gay erotica under his own name as well as several pseudonyms. He died in 1994 of complications related to AIDS.

Selected Bibliography

  • Safe Sex: the Ultimate Erotic Guide (1986)
  • Personal Dispatches: Writers Confront AIDS (1989)
  • The Big Gay Book: A Man's Survival Guide for the 90's (1991)
  • Hometowns: Gay men Write About Where They Belong (editor) (1991)
  • A member of the Family: Gay men Write About Their Families (editor) (1992)
  • My Live as a Pornographer & Other Indecent Acts (1993)
  • Sister & Brother: Lesbians & Gay Men Writer About Their Lives Together (editor)(1994)
  • Winter's Light: Reflections of a Yankee Queer (1995)
  • Franny, the Queen of Provincetown (1996)

Prince, Walter (1863 - 1934)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Walter Franklin Prince was born in Detroit, ME, received his A.B. (1896) and his Ph.D (1898) from Yale and a B.D. from Drew Theological Seminary (1897). He held several pastorates in various states (including Maine) until he left his last one in 1917 to become the assistant to Dr. James H. Hyslop at the American Society for Psychical Research. He became head of the Society after Hyslop's death in 1920 and helped to found the Boston Society for Psychic Research (1925) where he held the position of Executive Research Officer and Editor until his death. He is most well known for his work with an entity calling herself Patience Worth who began communicating through Pearl Curran, a St. Louis MI housewife.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Psychic in the House (1926)
  • Noted Witnesses for Psychic Occurrences: Incidents and Biographical Data, with Occasional Comments (1928)
  • the Case of Patience Worth: a Critical Study of Certain Unusual Phenomena (1929)
  • the Enchanted Boundary: Being a Survey of Negative Reactions to Claims of Psychic Phenomena 1820-1920 (1930)

Pulsifer, Susan (1893? - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Susan Farley Nichols Pulsifer's family moved from Boston to NYC before she was born. She attended the Brearly School in NYC, graduated from Bryn Mawr College (1915) and returned there in 1917 to teach. She interrupted her career to go to France during WWI to act as a nurses aide in a Red Cross hospital. When she returned, she received her MA in 1920 at Columbia University, then went to the Sorbonne and Oxford for graduate work. She married Harold Pulsifer in 1924.

Selected Bibliograpy

  • A House in Time (1959?)
  • L'esprit de la France: Chants de liberation =The Spirit of France, Songs of Liberation (1944)
  • Minute Magic: Children are Poets (1960)
  • Creative Writing Through Letters (1961)
  • Children are Poets (1963)
  • Witch's Breed: the Peirce-Nichols Family of Salem (1967)
  • Out of the Dust (1971)

Putz, George (1942? - 1992)

Genre: Non-Fiction

George J. Putz was born in Portland Oregon, attended Oregon schools and was a magna cum laude graduate of Lawrence University in Wisconsin. He taught at Franconia College and the University of New Hampshire for several years. He was an author and an environmentalist, editor of the Island Journal of the Island Institute in Rockland, ME, and co-editor of the Mariner's Catalogues.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Spirit of Massachusetts: Building a Tall Ship, 1983-1984 (1984)
  • The Maine Coast (1985)
  • Eagle, America's Sailing Square-Rigger (1986)
  • Wood and Canvas Kayak Building (1990)

Raychard, Al ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Al Raychard is the editor-at-large and muzzleloading columnist for Bear Hunting Magazine and writes a column for MuzzleBlasts, the official publication of the National Muzzleloading Rifle Assoication based in Friendship, Indiana. He lives in Lyman, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Al Raychard's Fly Fishing in Maine: the Complete Guide to the Best Fly Fishing in Maine (1980)
  • Trout & Salmon Fishing in Northern New England: a Guide to Selected Waters in Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont and Massachusetts (1982)
  • Al Raychard's Guide to Remote Trout Ponds in Maine (1984)
  • Flying-in for Trout: a Guide to Fishing the Remote Waters of Maine, Quebec, and Labrador (1987)
  • Fly Fishing the Salt: a Guide to Saltwater Fly Fishing from Maine to Chesapeake Bay (1989)
  • Salar!: an Angling Guide to Landlocked Salmon (1996)

Reed, William (1871 - 1962)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

William Maxwell Reed, or W. Maxwell Reed, was born in Bath, ME, attended Harvard, taught astronomy at Harvard and Princeton, then left academia for the steel industry. He began writing a series of letters to his nephew which became the first in a series of pioneering books teaching science to children.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Earth for Sam: the Story of Mountains, Rivers, Dinosaurs and Men (1930)
  • The Stars for Sam (1931)
  • And That's Why... (1932)
  • The Sea for Sam (1935)
  • Animals on the March (1937)
  • America's Treasure (1939)
  • The Sky is Blue (1940)
  • Patterns in the Sky: the Story of the Constellations (1951)

Reis, Patricia (1940 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Patricia Reis works as a psychotherapist and mentor. She received her B.A. in English Literature from the University of Wisconsin, an M.F.A. in sculpture from UCLA and an M.A. in Depth Psychology from the Pacifica Graduate Institute. She has exhibited nationally as a sculptor, worked as an illustrator, and held positions as faculty, lecturer and dissertation advisor. She was a co-founder of a spiritually-oriented educational program for women called The Women's Well.

Selected Bibliography

  • Through the Goddess: a Woman's Way of Healing (1991)
  • Daughters of Saturn: From Father's Daughter to Creative Woman (1995)
  • The Dreaming Way: Dreamwork and Art for Remembering and Recovery (2000)

Remington, Roger (1905? - 1983)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Roger Wolcott Remington was a native of Stamford, CT, graduated from the Loomis School in Windsor, CT, and attended the Wharton School of Business Administration of the University of Pennsylvania. He began his journalism career in 1929 working for the Boston Post doing general news reporting, covering the courts, writing features and special assignments. He joined the staff of the Bangor Daily News in 1946 as state editor, then wire services editor and columnist writing "Down the Road", a column which ran in the BDN as well as the Boston Sunday Herald. He also wrote short stories and magazine articles.

Bibliography

  • Adventures of These Three (1976)

Rensenbrink, John (1928 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

John Rensenbrink was born in Pease, MN in 1928. He worked on his family's dairy farm until he was 18, earning his high school diploma via correspondence course. He attended Calvin College (BA), the University of Michigan (MA), the University of Amsterdam as a Fulbright Scholar, and received his Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Chicago. He spent time in East Africa during the 1960's working on educational projects and was active in the anti-Vietnam War and anti-nuclear power movements.

Rensenbrink taught political science at Bowdoin College until his retirement (1989) when he left to start the Maine Green Independent Party. He ran as its candidate for U.S. Senator from Maine in 1996 and worked as campaign manager for two, subsequent Green Party candidates in Maine. He is a founding member of the Green Party of the United States, remains active in Maine's Green Party activities and is currently Professor Emeritus, Bowdoin College.

Selected Bibliography

  • Against All Odds: The Green Transformation of American Politics (1999)

Reynolds, Bethany ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Ellsworth resident Bethany Reynolds owns a fabric store, designs quilts, teaches quilting and has published several books about quilting.

Selected Bibliography

  • Magic Stack-N-Whack Quilts (1998)
  • Stars a la Carte: with Magic Stack-N-Whack Bonus Projects (2000)
  • Stack-N-Whackier Quilts (2001)
  • Magic Quilts by the Slice (2003)
  • 3 Quilters Celebrate the 4 Seasons: by the Calendar Girls (with Karen Combs and Joan Shay) (2004)

Reynolds, Edward (1856 - 1938)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Edward C. Reynolds was born in Braintree, MA, attended Cape Elizabeth schools, was one of the first four graduates from Cape Elizabeth High School (1877), and attended Georgetown University (L.L.M., 1886).

He was a resident of South Portland for many years, serving as Cumberland County Register of Probate (1889-97), Maine state senator (1897-99), and mayor of South Portland (1899-1900).

Selected Bibliography

  • The Maine Scholars' Manual: Arranged for the Use of Schools (1880)
  • The Cape Elizabeth High School: a History (1892)

Rice, Ed ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Ed Rice grew up in Bangor, ME, received his B.A. from Northeastern University and his M.Ed. from the University of Southern Maine. He has worked as a journalist and editor of the Brewer Weekly Journal and the Winchester, MA Town Crier. He teaches Communications and English in the Maine Community College System.

Selected Bibliography

  • Baseball's First Indian: Louis Sockalexis: Penobscot Legend, Cleveland Indian (2003)
  • Native Trailblazaer: Andrew Sockalexis: Penobscot Indian who Followed the Maine Running Path to Glory (2008)

Rich, Virginia (1914 - 1985)

Genre: Mystery

Virginia Rich was born in Sibley, IA. She was a food columnist for the Chicago Tribune using the pseudonym Mary Meade and worked as food editor for Sunset Magazine. She lived with her cattleman husband Ray Rich on a working ranch located outside Tucson, AZ and spent several months each year at her cottage on Cranberry Point in Corea, ME.

She has been credited as the pioneer of the "culinary mystery" sub genre of mystery novels.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Cooking School Murders (1982)
  • The Baked Bean Supper Murders (1982)
  • The Nantucket Diet Murders (1985)

Rich, Walter (1866 - 1948)

Genre: Illustrator, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Walter H. Rich graduated from Portland High School in 1885. As an adult, he worked with the Fisheries Service for 23 years and became the curator of the Portland Society of Natural History's Museum. He became a renowned artist, painting marine and bird life in watercolors and oils.

Selected Bibliography

  • Fishing Grounds of the Gulf of Maine (1929)
  • Feathered Game of the Northeast (1907)
  • The Swordfish and Swordfishery of New England (1947)

Selected Resources

Richards, Robert (1844 - 1945)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Robert Hallowell Richards was born in Gardiner, ME and was a member of the first graduating class from MIT. He taught at MIT for 46 years, as professor of mineralogy and of metallurgy, and head of the Department of Mining Engineering. His inventions were used to help separate ores and metals. He wrote over 100 monographs and articles related to mining and minerals as well as several books.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ore Dressing (1903-1909)
  • Text Book of Ore Dressing (1909)
  • Robert Hallowell Richards: His Mark (1936)

Richardson, Charles (1851 - 1913)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Charles Francis Richardson was born and raised in Hallowell, ME. He graduated from Dartmouth in 1871, worked as an newspaper editor, then was named Winckley Professor of Anglo Saxon and the English Language and Literature at Dartmouth College. A poet and literary historian. He wrote the first comprehensive history of American literature, completed in 1899. He lived for most of his life in New Hampshire where he died in 1913.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Cross: Poems (1879)
  • American Literature 1607-1885 (1889)
  • Hallowell Book: [Poems] (1902)
  • The Choice of Books (1905)
  • A Study of English Rhyme (1909)

Richardson, Edward (1921 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Edward T. Richardson, Jr. was born in Portland, Maine, is a graduate of South Portland High School and Bowdoin College. After serving in WWII, he attended Northeastern University Law School on the GI Bill, graduating and being admitted to the bar in 1950. In addition to his law practice Mr. Richardson also operated an insurance photography business, taught Constitutional Law at the Portland University Law School, and was a Field Investigator for the American Bar Foundation.

Selected Bibliography

  • Blood and Candles: The Story of a World War II Infantryman (2002)

Richmond, Bernice (1899 - 1983)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Bernice Richmond was a musician, actress, dancer and author who was born in Livermore Falls and grew up in Lewiston, ME. During the 1940's, she and her husband bought Mark Island, an abandoned lighthouse island off Winter Harbor. There, she began her writing career writing stories of the island and island life, and later, a book about her grandmother.

Selected Bibliography

  • Winter Harbor (1943)
  • Right as Rain: The Story of My Maine Grandmother (1946)
  • Our Island Lighthouse (1947)

Selected Resources

Riess, Warren (1947 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Maritime archaeologist and author Warren Curtis Riess earned his master's degree in Nautical Archaeology from Texas A&M University (1980), and a PhD in American History from the University of New Hampshire (1987). He is an associate research professor emeritus at the University of Maine and lives in Walpole, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Penobscot Expedition, 1779: List of Participating Patriots (2001)
  • Angel Gabriel: The Elusive English Galleon: Its History and the Search for its Remains (2001)
  • The Ship that Held up Wall Street (2015)

Rinehart, Mary (1876 - 1958)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction, Mystery, Romance Novel, Short Stories

Mary Roberts Rinehart was born and raised in Pittsburgh, PA but spent many summers in her home in Bar Harbor, ME. She is credited as being the American "Agatha Christie", though she began writing mysteries 14 years prior. She is also credited with creating the "had I only known" form of mysteries and with the phrase "the butler did it" even though she never really used it in any of her books. She wrote short stories, mysteries, romances and was a correspondent from the front during WWI for the *Saturday Evening Post."

Selected Bibliography

Books by Mary Roberts Rinehart

  • The Circular Staircase (1908)
  • The Man in Lower Ten (1909)
  • When a Man Marries (1909)
  • The Window at the White Cat (1910)

Books About Mary Roberts Rinehart

  • Had She But Known: A Biography of Mary Roberts Rinehart by Charlotte MacLeod

Ring, Elizabeth (1902 - 1997)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Elizabeth Ring was born in Orono, she received her Master's Degree in History from the University of Maine (1926) and was a fellow in Economics and Politics at Bryn Mawr (1930-31). She taught at high schools in Plymouth NH (1923-25) and Westerly RI (1926-30). During the 1930's, she received a Coe Research Fund Grant to continue the study of local history. She taught Maine history at the University of Maine (1938) and Bates College (1939-40) and substituted at South Portland High School during WWII.

She was the first in the state to study local history as a subject area and later the first to teach it.

She was well known for her study of the McArthur Family of Limington which she used to chronicle life in a small, Maine town.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Progressive Movement of 1912 and Third Party Movement of 1924 in Maine (1933)
  • Aids to the Teaching of Maine in the Public Schools
  • Maine Bibliographies: A Bibliographical Guide (1973)
  • The Myth of a One Party State (1977)
  • The McArthurs of Limington, Maine 1783-1917: The Family in America a Century Ago (1992)
  • A Reference List of Manuscripts Relating to the History of Maine (1992)
  • Maine in the Making of the Nation 1783-1870 (1996)

Risen, Celia ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Celia C. Risen is a retired teacher who summers in Maine. She became interested in Jewish history while teaching ESL classes in Maryland. She began to research the stories of Russian and Eastern European immigrants who settled in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Yankee Fiddler: A Man Called Suss (1988)
  • Some Jewels of Maine: Jewish Maine Pioneers (1997)

Rivard, Paul (1944 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Historian and author Paul Rivard is a native of Sanford and has lived in Springvale. He holds a degree in American History from the University of Maine and a master's degree in museum administration from the State University of New York. He was the Director of the Maine State Museum for many years and also served as the director of the Museum of American Textile History in North Andover, MA.

Selected Bibliography

  • Made in Maine: An Historical Overview (1985)
  • Lion: The History of an 1846 Locomotive in Maine (1987)
  • Made in Maine: A Case Study in History MuseumExhibit Development (1988)
  • Maine Sawmills: A History (1990)
  • A New Order of Things: How the Textile Industry Transformed New England (2002)
  • Made in Maine: From Home and Workshop, to Mill and Factory (2007)

Riviere, William (1917 - 2005)

Genre: Non-Fiction

William A. (Bill) Riviere was born in Manchester, New Hampshire, where he went to high school. During World War II, he served with the US Border Patrol in Maine. He also worked as a licensed Maine hunting and fishing guide, a logger, night police officer, and newspaper editor. In 1962, he founded the Maine School of Camping in Rangeley, ME.

Bibliography

  • Squire Rangeley Slept Here, Or, Why I came to Rangeley on Vacation in 1939--and Haven't Gone Home Yet (1955)
  • The Camper's Bible (1961)
  • The L. L. Bean Guide to the Outdoors (1981)
  • The Open Canoe (1985)
  • The Gunner's Bible: The Most Complete Guide to Sporting Firearms: Rifles, Shotguns, Handguns, and Their Accessories

Selected Resources

Albion, Michele (1967 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Michele Wehrwein Albion grew up in the Augusta area, attended Augusta schools, graduated from Cony High School and the University of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Florida Life of Thomas Edison (2008)
  • The Quotable Edison (2011)
  • The Quotable Eleanor Roosevelt (2013)

Arsenault, Timothy ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Horror

Originally from Auburn, Maine, and a 1988 graduate of Edward Little High School, T.G. Arsenault retired from the U. S. Air Force after 22 years of service. He has received a BS in Workforce Education, Training and Development from Southern Illinois University and a MS in Management from Troy University. His first novel, Forgotten Souls, was published in November, 2005 by Five Star Publishing. His short fiction has also appeared in multiple online venues and anthologies. His short story The Eighth Day, also received an honorable mention in the Year?s Best Fantasy and Horror, Sixteenth Annual Collection.

Selected Bibliography

  • Forgotten Souls (2005)
  • Bleeding the Vein (2012)

Robinson, Gertrude (1872 - 1958)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Young Adult

Gertrude Robinson was born in Canaan, NH, received her Ph.B (1902) Syracuse University, A.M. (1917) New York University, taught math and sociology at Marot Junior College, Thompson CT. Her summer home was at Orrs Island, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sachim Bird (1936)
  • Chee-Chee's Brother (1937)
  • Robeen (1938)
  • Winged Feet: Scouting for George Washington (1939)
  • Bringing up Raffles (1940)
  • Sons of Liberty (1941)
  • We Learn to Write: Life Story of the Tools We Use in Expressing Our Thoughts, in Recording the Word (1941)
  • Fox Fire (1944)
  • Mother Penny (1946)
  • Father and the Mountains (1950)
  • Smoking Hoof (1951)
  • Spindleshanks (1954)

Robinson, Mabel (1874 - 1962)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Author and educator Mabel Louise Robinson was born in Waltham, MA, attended normal school, then Radcliffe College (1904-06), and took her master's (1907)and doctorate (1915) at Columbia University. She taught elementary school and at several different colleges and universities, and she taught advanced fiction writing at Columbia from 1919-1945 (author Farley Mowatt, writer of the Black Stallion books was one of her students). She wrote many books for children, often featuring dogs and set on the Maine coast. She won two Newbery Honors for Bright Island (1938) and for Runner of the Mountain Tops (1940).

Selected Bibliography

  • Little Lucia (1922)
  • All By Ourselves (1924)
  • Dr. Tam O'Shanter (1931)
  • Little Lucia's Island Camp (1932)
  • Strong Wings (1951)
  • Skipper Riley, the Terrier Sea Dog (1955)

Selected Resources

Wilson, Meg (1962 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Young Adult

Meg Wilson was born in Boston MA, moved to Yarmouth in 1969, attended Yarmouth schools, then earned her BA in English and Sociology from the University of Maine (Orono) in 1984. She lives in North Yarmouth and Monson.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mourning Dove (2012)
  • Crappy New Year (2012)

Robinson, Thomas (1878 - 1954)

Genre: Children's Literature, Drama/Theatre/Film, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Architect, author, playwright and poet Thomas Pendleton Robinson was born in Calais, ME, grew up in Pennsylvania and studied architecture at M.I.T. He lived in Boston and Hingham, MA.

Selected Bibliography

  • Houses in America (1936) with Ethel Fay Robinson
  • Buttons (1938)
  • Your Own House (1941)
  • Pete (1941)
  • Mr. Red Squirrel (1943)
  • In and Out (1943)
  • Trigger John's Son (1950)
  • Lost Dog Jerry (1952)

Selected Resources

Roderick, John (1914 - 2008)

Genre: Non-Fiction

John Roderick was born in Waterville, ME and orphaned at an early age. He began his career in journalism at the age of 15 when he began writing for the Waterville Morning Sentinel. He graduated from Colby College, then joined the Associated Press office in Portland in 1937. In 1942, he moved to the AP office in Washington D.C. but was drafted in 1943. He served in the OSS durring WWII and stationed in China. After the war, he stayed in China working as an AP foreign correspondent. He lived with and reported on Mao Zedong and the other Communist rebels in the caves near the Gobi Desert during their raids against the Japanese and the Kuomintang. He relocated to the Middle East in 1948 to cover the formation of the country of Israel, but remained interested in China and its politics. In 1979, after Nixon's visit and the re-normalization of relations between the U.S. and China, he returned there and became head of the Beijing Bureau of the Associated Press. He died in Hawaii in 2008.

Selected Bibliography

  • Covering China: The Story of an American Reporter from Revolutionary Days to the Deng Era (1993)
  • Minka: My Farmhouse in Japan (2008)

Rodick, Burleigh (1889 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Burleigh Cushing Rodick was born in Freeport, ME, attended Bowdoin, Harvard and Columbia Universities and was a writer, teacher and lecturer.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Doctrine of Necessity in International Law (1928)
  • My Own New England: Tales of Vanishing Types (1929)
  • American Constitutional Custom: A Forgotten Factor in the Founding (1953)

Rolfe, Eldred ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Eldred Rolfe grew up in Western Maine and attended Farmington State Teachers College. He then went on to earn his MA and Ph.D. at Michigan State University before returning to Farmington. He began teaching as a professor at UMF in 1966 and held two stints as chair, first of the Geography Department and of the Department of Social Sciences and Business.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Geography of Maine (1981)
  • Maine: A Geography (1986)

Rossel, Greg (1951 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Greg Rossel grew up in Staten Island, NY. He moved to Maine in the 1970's as a part of the "back to the land" movement. He decided to take a two-year program at Washington County Vocational Technical Institute in Lubec called The Boat School. He has worked in boatyards, at the Maine Maritime Museum in Bath, ME, helped start a boat factory in Mexico, started his own boat-building shop at his home and worded for the Wooden Boat School in Brooklin, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Building Small Boats (1998)
  • Kayaks You Can Build: An Illustrated Guide to Plywood Construction (2004) with Ted Moores
  • The Boatbuilder's Apprentice: The Ins and Outs of Building Lapstrake, Carvel, Stitch-and-Glue, Strip-planked, and Other Wooden Boats (2007)

du Houx, Ramona ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Illustrator, Poetry

Ramona du Houx is a photographer, illustrator, author, publisher and poet. A native of Michigan, she has traveled the world teaching photography and conversational English. She moved to Maine in 1991 and opened a publishing company, Polar Bear and Company as well as a news magazine called Maine Insights. She lives in Solon, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Manitou: A Mythological Journey in Time (1999)
  • Women Who Walk with the Sky by Dawn Renee Levesque (Illustrator) (2002)
  • Wisdom of Bear with Holly Barry and Dawn Renee Levesque (2005)
  • Seasons: Poems with David Kroner (2006)

Blanco, Richard (1968 - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet Richard Blanco's family emigrated to Spain, where he was born, then to Miami, FL. He received his degree in engineering from Florida International University and worked as an engineer in Miami, then returned to FIU where he received his master's degree in fine arts and creative writing. His work has appeared in literary journals such as Ploughshares, TriQuarterly, Michigan Quarterly, and in anthologies such as Best American Poetry 2000, Best American Prose Poems and on National Public Radio. He is recipient of a Bread Loaf Fellowship and a Florida Artist Fellowship. He has taught at Georgetown, American University and Connecticut State University.

He was chosen by President Barack Obama to write and read a poem written specially for the 2013 Presidential Inauguration. He lives in Bethel, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • City of a Hundred Fires (1998)
  • The Beach of the Dead (2005)
  • Looking for the Gulf Motel (2012) winner, 2013 Maine Literary Awards Book Award for Poetry

Selected Links

Rowland, John (1888 - 1945)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

John Tilghman Rowland was attended Andover, served in the U.S. Navy in both world wars, was a designer and builder of small boats and a journalist on maritime affairs. He lived in Newcastle, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • North to Adventure (1963)
  • The Good Beasts: Memories, Mostly Fond, of Animals Wild and Tame (1964)
  • Wind and Salt Spray: The Autobiography of a Sailor (1965)

Selected Resources

Roy, Travis (1975 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Travis Roy was born in Augusta, ME, attended Yarmouth High School, North Yarmouth Academy on an athletic scholarship, and graduated from Tabor Academy receiving an athletic scholarship to Boston University. On October 20, 1995, just eleven seconds into his first-ever shift for the BU hockey team, he slid head-first into the boards, injuring his fourth and fifth vertebra and leaving him a quadriplegic.

In 1997, he started the Travis Roy Foundation to help spinal cord injury survivors and fund research for a cure.

He collaborated with Sports Illustrated writer E. M. Swift to write his autobiography.

Bibliography

  • Eleven Seconds: A Story of Tragedy, Courage & Triumph (with E. M. Swift) (1998)

Rush, Helene ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

H?l?ne Rush is the current owner of Knit One Crochet Too in Windham, ME. She brings over 25 years of experience to the industry as a designer for all major knitting magazines, author of five knitting books, and past editor of McCall's Needlework and Crafts magazine, and Cast On magazine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Woods Woolies: 30 Quick-to-Knit Sweaters for Children (1986)
  • More Maine Sweaters: 30 Original Designs in Wool, Cotton, Silk, and Alpaca (1987)
  • Sweaters By Hand (with Rachael Emmons) ( 1988)
  • Head to Toe: 30 Original Designs for Hats, Mittens, and other Accessories (1989)
  • The Knitter's Design Sourcebook: 127 Charted Motifs to Use in Your Own Original Designs (1991)

Russell, Arthur (1861 - 1945)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Russell was born in Hallowell, Maine in 1861, the son of Joseph and Mary (Haskell) Russell. He graduated from Bowdoin College in 1879 and worked on the Portland, Maine Advertiser. In 1885 he came to Minneapolis and was employed as a proofreader for the Minneapolis Journal. From that time until his retirement in the 1940s, he was associated with the Journal and the Minnetonka Record as a columnist and in other capacities.

Selected Bibliography

  • Fourth Street (1917)
  • The Eternity Club and Its Discovery of the Fairylands of the Aged (1921)
  • (1922)
  • One of Our First Families: And a Few Other Minnesota Essays (1925)
  • The Other Side of a Street (1931)

Selected Resources

Sager, Susan ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Susan Joy Sager is an artist and administrator who founded ArtBiz in 1993 to provide professional development for artists and craftspeople by offering career counseling sessions and business seminars. Susan is a graduate of the Lake Placid School of Art, Lake Placid, NY, with a Diploma in Painting and Photography and Hampshire College, Amherst, MA, with a BA degree in Photography and History.

Selected Bibliography

  • Selling Your Crafts (1998)
  • Creative Careers in Crafts (2004)

Salmansohn, Pete ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Pete Salmansohn a/k/a "Puffin Pete" received his M.S. in Teaching from the Environmental Studies Department at Antioch/New England and his M.S. in Social Ecology from Goddard College. He has instructed adults at the Audubon Ecology Camp in Maine for nine summers, children for seventeen seasons, and still teaches at the family camp and during special education weeks. Pete is the Education Coordinator for the Seabird Restoration Program and helps "Seabird Sue" Schubel coordinate the school outreach program. Pete gives lectures about the Seabird Restoration Program, and narrates the Audubon seabird tours aboard commercial boats. In 1998 the Maine Environmental Education Association named Pete as the Environmental Educator of the Year.

Selected Bibliography

  • Project Puffin: How We Brought Puffins Back to Egg Rock (1997) (with Stephen W. Kress)
  • Giving Back to the Earth: A Teacher's Guide to Project Puffin and Other Seabird Studies (1997)(with Stephen W. Kress)
  • Saving Birds: Heroes Around the World (2003)

Sample, Tim (1951 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Illustrator, Short Stories

Tim Sample was born in Fort Fairfield and raised in Boothbay Harbor, ME. He is known as a Maine humorist, illustrator and author having recorded several albums and authored/illustrated many books of Downeast humor. He has also worked as a correspondent for CBS news and as an essayist for CBS This Morning. He has homes in Portland and Washington County, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Hoskins's Cow by Holman Day (illustrator) (1983)
  • Aunt Shaw's Pet Jug by Holman Day (illustrator) (1983)
  • Saturday Night at Moody's Diner and Other Stories (1985)
  • How to Talk Yankee by Gerald E. Lewis (illustrator) (1986)
  • Postcards from Maine: Stories and Drawings (1988)
  • Stories Told in the Kitchen by Kendall Morse (illustrator) (1989)
  • Maine Curiosities: Quirky Characters, Roadside Oddities & Other Offbeat Stuff with Steve Bither (2002)

Samuelson, Joan (1957 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Joan Benoit Samuelson was born in Cape Elizabeth, ME, graduated from Bowdoin College and lives in Freeport, ME. She is well-known as the gold medal winner of the first women's Olympic marathon held at the 1984 games, the only American woman ever to win.

Selected Bibliography

  • Running Tide (1987)
  • Joan Samuelson's Running for Women 1995 (with Gloria Averbuch

Sand, Ginny (Virginia) (1956 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Virginia (Ginny) Sand was born in Waterville, ME and attended Waterville schools. She earned a Bachelor of Science Degree from the University of Maine at Farmington and a Master of Education Degree from the University of Maine at Orono. She taught school for several years. She lives in Bangor, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Embrace Life Cookbook: The Rainbow Kitchen: A Vegetarian Cookbook (1996)
  • Iris & the Sea Dogs (1996)
  • Ma Lapine Sucre: Une Histoire Vraie (My Rabbit, Sugar: A True Story) (2005)

Sandford, Frank (1862 - 1948)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Frank Weston Sandford was born in Bowdoinham, ME, graduated from Bates College (1886) and attended Cobb Divinity School. He worked as a pastor and evangelical preacher, forming the Shiloh sect in 1894. He died in Hobart, NY.

Selected Bibliography

  • Seven Years--With God (1900)
  • The Majesty of Snowy Whiteness (1963)
  • The Art of War for the Christian Soldier (1966)
  • The Golden Light upon the Two Americas

Brown, Allen (Mike) (1929 - 2011)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Allen D. "Mike" Brown was born in Belfast, ME, graduated from Crosby High School (1947), then joined the Marine Corps and served in the 1st Marine Division in Korea. Using the pen name "Cap'n Perc Sane", he wrote a letter to the editor of the Maine Coast Fisherman and began a 60-year career in journalism as a reporter, monthly columnist and editor of two local newspapers, The Republican Journal and the Camden Herald. He died at his home in Saturday Cove in 2011.

Selected Bibliography

  • Saturday Cove (as Cap'n Perc Sane) (1969)
  • The Great Lobster Chase: The Real Story of Maine Lobsters and the Men Who Catch Them (1985)
  • The Maine Lobster Book (1986)

Sane, Cap'n Perc ( - )

Genre:

Cap'n Perc Sane was the pen name for journalist and author Allen D. "Mike" Brown.

Sanger, David (1936 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Dr. David Sanger, professor emeritus of the University of Maine (Orono) lives in Orono, ME. A retired field archaeologist, Dr. Sanger continues to research and write about the pre-European archaeology of Maine and the Maritimes.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Prehistory: A Selection of Short Papers (1973) with Robert G. MacKay
  • Cow Point: An Archaic Cemetery in New Brunswick (1973)
  • Discovering Maine's Archaeological Heritage (1979)
  • An Island in Time: Three Thousand Years of Cultural Exchange on Mount Desert Island: Essays (1994)

Savage, Elizabeth (1918 - 1989)

Genre: General Fiction, Romance Novel, Short Stories

Born in Hingham, MA, author Elizabeth Savage grew up in the West and thought of herself as a "westerner." She graduated from Colby College (B.A. magna cum laude 1940) and lived in Chicago, Montan and Massachusetts before settling in Georgetown, ME for 30 years. She was primarily known as a novelist, but her short fiction also appeared in the Paris Review, Cosmopolitan, Redbook, and the Saturday Evening Post.

Selected Bibliography

  • Summer of Pride: A Novel (1961)
  • But Not For Love: A Novel (1970)
  • A Fall of Angels (1971)
  • Happy Ending: A Novel
  • The Last Night at the Ritz: A Novel (1973)
  • A Good Confession: A Novel (1975)
  • The Girls from the Five Great Valleys: A Novel (1977)
  • Willowwood: A Novel (1978)
  • Toward the End: A Novel (1980)

Selected Resources

Savage, Minot (1841 - 1918)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Minot Judson Savage was born in Norridgewock, ME, graduated from the Bangor Theological Seminary (1864) and served for nine years as a Congregational minister in various locations. In 1873, he became a Unitarian and served in several parishes. He was a popular preacher and his sermons were widely distributed in pamphlet form. He also wrote books about evolution, biblical criticism and comparative religion. He died in Boston in 1918.

Selected Bibliography

  • My Creed (1887)
  • Pillars of the Temple (1904)

Selected Resources

Savage, Thomas (1915 - 1989)

Genre: General Fiction

Author Thomas Savage was born in Salt Lake City, UT moved to Montana where he graduated from Beaverhead County High School, attended Montana State College (today the University of Montana then transferred to Colby College (B.A. 1940). He taught at Suffolk University in Boston and Brandeis. He left teaching to write primarily stories based in the West. He lived in Georgetown, ME for many years.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Strange God (1974)
  • Midnight Line: A Novel (1976)
  • Her Side of It
  • The Power of the Dog (1982)
  • For Mary with Love (1983)
  • The Corner of Rife and Pacific (1988)
  • The Sheep Queen: A Novel (2001)

Selected Resources

Sawyer, Margaret (1914 - 2000)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Margaret Merry Sawyer was born in Madison, ME, attended schools in Fillmore, CA and Norridgewock, ME and graduated from the Maine School of Commerce in Auburn, ME. She served as selectman for the town of Waterford, was a member of the SAD 17 Board of Directors and a board member of the Oxford Hills YMCA. She was an avid mountain climber and runner.

Selected Bibliography

  • Reaching for the Summit (1922)
  • Sage, Rosemary and Rhyme: Poems (1995)

Scee, Trudy ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Trudy Irene Scee is a native New Yorker who moved to Maine to complete her Ph.D at the University of Maine and stayed. She lives in Brewer. She writes books on local history.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mount Hope Cemetery: A Twentieth-Century History (1999)
  • In the Deeds We Trust: Baxter State Park, 1970-1994 (1999)
  • the Inmates and the Asylum: The Bangor Children's Home, 1835-2002 (2002)
  • N. H. Bragg & Sons: 150 Years of Service to the Maine Community and Economy, 1854-2004 (2005)
  • Trudy Scee's Dictionary of Maine Words and Phrases (2005)
  • Tragedy in the North Woods: The Murders of James Hicks (2009)
  • City on the Penobscot: A Comprehensive History of Bangor, Maine (2010)
  • Mount Hope Cemetery of Bangor, Maine: The Complete History (2012)
  • Moving the Earth: The Life and Work of Herbert E. Sargent 1906-2006 (2015)
  • Changing the World Two Kids at a Time : Timothy P. Wilson and the Seeds of Peace (2019)

Schauffler, F. Marina ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Marina Schauffler is an independent writer and editor who runs the communications firm Natural Choices in midcoast Maine. Her essays, articles and columns explore environmental issues and sustainable practices -- asking thoughtful questions about how we might live in more wholesome ways. Her column "Sea Change", runs every other week in the Maine Sunday Telegram. She holds a Ph.D. in ecological ethics and spiritual values and an MA in creative nonfiction writing.

Selected Bibliography

  • Conservation Options: A Guide for Maine Landowners (1994)
  • Turning to Earth: Stories of Ecological Conversion (2003)

Schlick, Edward (1928 - )

Genre: Poetry

Ricmond, ME resident Edward C. Schlick was born in Newark, NJ and grew up in nearby Keany, NJ. He studied painting and design at Pratt Institute School of Art and Design in New York and later at Colby College. During an enlistment in the U.S. Army, Schlick served as an artist/illustrator in Japan.

Following his discharge from the Army Schlick attended the University of San Francisco where he received his B.A. He taught painting and watercolor at the California Labor School where he also studied ceramics and silk screen printing.

He did graduate work at Bates College and the University of Maine before becoming a middle school teacher. In 1952, he became a radio news reporter for WHEB in Portsmouth, NH which sharpened his interest in politics. After this brief stint, he became a political and legislative reporter for the Lewiston Sun Journal. In 1960 he became the executive director of the Maine Democratic Party, then became a freelance consultant on a wide range of media, political and journalistic topics, advising various groups within the state government, the Maine Democratic Party, and the AFL-CIO.

Selected Bibliography

  • Unexpected Arrival: {Poems] (1980)
  • Mysterious Victory (1996)

Selected Resources

Smiley, Sarah (1976 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Columnist and author Sarah Smiley has been a Navy dependent for more than 36 years. She was born in San Diego and raised in Virginia Beach. She is the daughter of retired admiral Lindell Rutherford, a career Navy F-14 pilot, and spent most of her upbringing amid the aircraft carriers and Navy bases in Virginia Beach, Virginia.

She has a B.S. in Education from Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama, and a M.A. in Mass Communication from the University of Maine. She is the mother of three young boys and the wife of a Navy pilot. They live in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dinner with the Smileys : one military family, one year of heroes, and lessons for a lifetime (2013)

Fecteau, Amy ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Horror

Author Amy Fecteau was born and raised in Standish, ME. According to Amy's website, as a child Amy wanted to be a doctor-farmer-princess, but unfortunately the market for doctor-farmer princesses just isn't what it used to be. Also, Amy was born in the United States, severely limiting her chances to become royalty.

Amy lives in Gorham, Maine and is studying computer science.

Selected Bibliography

  • Real Vampires Don't Sparkle (2013)

Selected Links

Tuck, Lily (1938 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

An American citizen born in Paris, award-winning author Lily Tuck divides her time between NYC and Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The News from Paraguay (2004) National Book Award
  • I Married You For Happiness (2011)
  • The House at Belle Fontaine: Stories (2013)
  • The Double Life of Liliane: A Novel (2014)
  • Sisters: A Novel (2017)
  • Heathcliff Redux: A Novella and Stories (2020)

Kennedy, Douglas (1955 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Author Douglas Kennedy was born in New York City, educated at The Collegiate School and graduated with a B.A. magna cum laude from Bowdoin College in 1976. He is the author of twelve novels. He divides his time between London, Paris, Berlin, Montreal, Maine and New York

Selected Bibliography

  • In Pursuit of Happiness (2010)
  • Leaving the World (2010)
  • A Special Relationship: A Novel (2011)
  • The Woman in the Fifth
  • The Moment: A Novel (2011)
  • Temptation: A Novel (2012)
  • Five Days: A Novel (2013)

Miles, Kathryn (1974 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Kathryn Miles is an award-winning science writer -- she has published her work in dozens of publications, including Best American Essays, Ecotone, How To Write About Anything, History, Outside Magazine, and Popular Mechanics.

She attended college at Saint Louis University where she received a PhD in literary theory.

Miles currently serves as writer-in-residence for Green Mountain College, as a faculty member for Chatham University's low-residency MFA program, and as a scholar-in-residence for the Maine Humanities Council.

Selected Bibliography

  • Adventures with Ari: A Puppy, A Leash & Our Year Outdoors (2009)
  • All Standing: The Remarkable Story of the Jeanie Johnston, the Legendary Irish Famine Ship (2013)
  • Superstorm: Nine Days Inside Hurricane Sandy(2014)

Souza, Joseph ( - )

Genre: Horror, Short Stories

Joseph Souza's award-winning short stories have been published in various literary journals throughout the country. Winner of the 2004 Andre Dubus Award for short fiction from the University of Southern Maine, he also received Honorable Mention for the Al Blanchard award in crime fiction. He lives in South Portland, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Reawakening 2012 Winner, Maine Literary Awards Book Award for Speculative Fiction
  • The Neighbor (2018)
  • Pray for the Girl (2019)
  • The Perfect Daughter (2020)

Erard, Michael ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

After graduating from Williams College, Michael Erard lived overseas teaching English, then finished his MA in linguistics and PhD in English, with concentrations in rhetoric and linguistics, from the University of Texas at Austin. He is a senior researcher and metaphor designer at the FrameWorks Institute, a research non-profit based in Washington, D.C. He writes mainly about language, languages, and the people who use and study them and about culture and technology. His essays, reviews, and reportage have appeared in The New York Times, The New York Times Book Review, Science, Wired, Slate, The Atlantic, New Scientist, Reason, The Morning News, among other magazines and newspapers.

He is a contributing writer at The Morning News and Design Observer and have a blog at Psychology Today.

Selected Bibliography

  • Um?: Slips, Stumbles, and Verbal Blunders, and What They Mean- (2007)
  • Babel No More: The Search for the World?s Most Extraordinary Language Learners (2012)winner, 2013 Maine Literary Awards Book Award for Nonfiction

Barton, Andrew ( - )

Genre:

Raised in the southern Appalachians of western North Carolina, Andrew Barton is a forest and fire ecologist, science writer, and professor of biology. His research focuses on how forests are responding to changing climate and wildfires in the Sky Islands of the American Southwest. He is the author of the award-winning book, The Changing Nature of the Maine Woods, and Ecology and Recovery of Old-growth Forests in Eastern North America from Island Press. Drew co-founded the Michigan National Forest Watch and the UMF Sustainable Campus Coalition, and was a key player in the Mt. Blue-Tumbledown Conservation Alliance, which protected 30,000 acres of forestland in western Maine. He teaches courses on ecology, conservation, plants, and forests, as well as a travel course on the ecology of Costa Rica. 1991 PhD University of Michigan, 1984 MS University of Florida, and 1980 AB Brown University.

Bibliography

  • The Changing Nature of the Maine Woods winner, 2013 Maine Literary Awards John N. Cole Award for Maine-Themed Nonfiction

Cummins, Deborah, Deborah (1949 - 2023)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Born and raised in Chicago, Deborah Cummins earned a B.A. in English at Northern Illinois University and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing at the University of Houston.

She has taught writing at the University of Chicago, Columbia College, the Center for Talent Development at Northwestern University, and Chicago?s Newberry Library and Terra Museum of American Art. She has been a visiting writer at Lyon College, University of Nebraska at Kearney, and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Working with high school and elementary students, she has served as an Arts-in-Education Residency Artist for the Illinois Arts Council , a Writer-in-Residence at the Menil Art Collection and a writing instructor in various Chicago area public schools and with Writers in the Schools in Houston. For three years, she was the assistant director of the White River Writers? Workshop at Lyon College in Arkansas. Currently, she curates poetry events for Opera House Arts in Stonington, Maine.

Deborah Cummins is the recipient of numerous awards, fellowships and prizes, including several from the Illinois Arts Council and a James Michener Fellowship. She has been awarded residencies at Yaddo, MacDowell Colony, Ragdale Foundation and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts.

Her poems and essays have appeared in eight anthologies and more than sixty journals and magazines. Her poetry has also been featured on Garrison Keillor?s The Writer?s Almanac, in Ted Kooser?s American Life in Poetry syndicated newspaper column and on the Poetry Daily and Verse Daily web sites. She has given numerous public readings in a variety of venues, including book stores, libraries, conferences, festivals, galleries, and in lecture and reading series. She has also been interviewed on radio shows in Chicago and Kansas City.

Until recently she was a board member of the Poetry Foundation and served as its Board Chair from 1001-2005 as the Foundation transitioned from a small 501C3 non-profit to an operating foundation following an historic bequest by the late Lily pharmaceutical heiress and philanthropist Ruth Lilly.

Deborah Cummins and her husband reside in Chicago, IL and Deer Isle, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Beyond the Reach (Poems) (2002)
  • Counting the Waves (Poems) (2006)
  • Here and Away: Discovering Home on an Island in Maine (essay collection)(2012) Winner, 2013 Maine Literary Awards Short Works Competition: Nonfiction

Scott, Sally (1909 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's author Sally Scott was the daughter of noted activist and author Dorothy Canfield Fisher. She lived in Bar Harbor where she was librarian at the high school.

Selected Bibliography

  • Benjie and His Family (1952)
  • Jonathan (1953)
  • Chica (1954)
  • Bobby and His Band (1954)
  • Judy's Surprising Day (1957)
  • Judy's Summer Adventure (1960)

Selected Resources

Searway, Ruby (1898 - 1988)

Genre: Poetry

Teacher, author and poet, Ruby Garrison Searway lived in Ashland, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • This and That: In Memory of Those Who Have Gone Before (19--)
  • Time to Remember (1964)
  • Yesterday's Tomorrow (1972)

Selected Resources

Segal, Howard (1948 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Howard P. Segal is a native of Philadelphia, Pa. He attended Franklin and Marshall College (B.A.) and Princeton University (M.A.) (Ph.D.) and has taught at the University of Maine since 1986. He specializes in the history of technology and is director of the Technology & Society Project.

Selected Bibliography

  • Technological Utopianism in American Culture (1985)
  • Technology in America: A Brief History (1989) (with Alan I. Marcus)
  • Future Imperfect: The Mixed Blessings of Technology in America (1994)
  • Technology, Pessimism, and Postmodernism (1994)
  • Life in a Technocracy: What it Might be Like (1996)
  • Recasting the Machine Age: Henry Ford's village Industries (2005)
  • Technological Utopianism in American Culture (2005)
  • Technology and Utopia (2006)
  • Utopias: A Brief History from Ancient Writings to Virtual Communities (2012)

Senate, Melissa ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Romance Novel

Melissa Senate was born in the Catskills, lived in New York City as a child, New Jersey as a teenager, Connecticut for college, Brooklyn for a few years after college, the Upper East Side of Manhattan for 14 years, then moved to coastal Maine in 2005. She worked as an editor for several years but when her first novel sold in 2001, she became a full-time author.

Selected Bibliography

  • Whose Wedding Is It Anyway? (2004)
  • Theodora Twist: A Novel (2006)
  • The Breakup club (2006)
  • Love You to Death (2007)
  • The Secret of Joy: a Novel (2009)
  • The Mosts (2010)
  • The Love Goddess' Cooking School (2010)

Shenton, Edward (1933 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Edward "Ned" Shenton grew up in small town Pennsylvania, the son of an famous illustrator father and a writer mother. He studied oceanography at Texas A&M and worked in the field for many years. He became an expert in underwater craft and eventually joined Jacques Cousteau's famous diving saucer crew. Along the way he worked on teams that photographed the early space satellites and drilled into the Greenland ice sheet. He has a home on Peaks Island, ME

Selected Bibliography

  • Exploring the Ocean Depths: The Story of the Cousteau Diving Saucer in the Pacific
  • Diving for Science: The Story of the Deep Submersible (1972)
  • An Historical Review of Oil Spills Along the Maine Coast, 1953-1973 (1973)
  • An Annotated bibliography of OCS Documents in Maine (1977)
  • A Future Land Use Plan for Cutler, Maine: A Study (1979)

Sherman, Charles (1847 - 1944)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Charles Pomeroy Sherman was an attorney in New York and Pennsylvania and owned a home called Sunny-Ledge on Ash Point in Harpswell, ME where he summered for over 30 years.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Winning Quest (1934)
  • My Scrap Book of Many Years, 1864 to 1938 (1938)
  • The Falmouth Massacre in 1676 (1942)

Rowell, Victoria (1959 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Victoria Rowell was born and raised in Portland, ME. She has been a dancer (ballet), model and actress as well as an author. A foster child herself, she founded the Rowell Foster Children Positive Plan in 1990. She was awarded an honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters by the University of Southern Maine in recognition of her work for the benefit of foster children.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Women who Raised Me: a Memoir (2007)
  • Secrets of a Soap Opera Diva (2010)
  • Tag, Toss & Run (2012) with Paul Tukey

Donovan, Gail (1962 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Gail Donovan is a graduate of Sarah Lawrence College and Brown University where she earned her Master?s in writing. She writes books about children in grade school.

Selected Bibliography - In Memory of Gorfman T. Frog (2009) - What's Bugging Bailey Blecker? (2011)

Shute, Alberta (1907 - 1996)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Alberta Van Morn Shute was born in East Boothbay, attended East Boothbay schools, Lincoln Academy, Colby College, and Gorham Normal School (now USM Gorham). She taught school in Boothbay and Augusta, worked in the Maine Department of Health and Welfare, wrote a weekly column called "R.F.D.4" in the Kennebec Journal and authored several books, including memoirs of living and growing up in the Boothbay Harbor area. She also published short stories in local publications such as the Boothbay Register. In her later years, she lived in Manchester, ME. She died in 1996 at the age of 89.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Year and a Day Along Bond Brook (1954)
  • A Year and a Day in the Park (1956)
  • "Or Ever the Silver Cord" (1957)
  • A Year and a Day on the Farm (1972)
  • History of the North Manchester Youth Group (1977)
  • History of the North Manchester Meeting House (1978)
  • "Keep Thy Heart": [Poems] (1979)
  • M Notebook of Interesting Old Houses and the People who Lived in Them (1981)

Sills, Kenneth (1879 - 1954)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Kenneth Charles Morton Sills was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He graduated Summa Cum Laude from Bowdoin College, and pursued graduate degrees at Columbia University ahd Harvard. He worked at Columbia for a short tiem, then returned to Bowdoin in 1906 to teach. He became president of the college in 1918 and continued as such until 1952. He was a published poet, but is probably best know for writing Bowdoin's Alma Mater, "Rise, Sons of Bowdoin."

Selected Bibliography

  • Historical Sketch of S. Luke's Parish, Portland, Maine (1886)
  • The First American: And Other Poems (1911)
  • A Memorial Address for those Bowdoin Men who Gave Their Lives in the War (1919)
  • Maine Historical Memorials (1922)
  • Joseph McKeen (1757-1807) and the Beginnings of Bowdoin College (1945)

Silsby, Herbert (1925 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Herbert T. Silsby, II was born in Aurora, ME and moved to Ellsworth as a teenager. He graduated from Bowdoin College in 1947, passed the bar after two years of study at Boston University Law School, and spent 25 years in private practice as an attorney. He first served as a judge at age 26 in the municipal court in Ellsworth and was appointed to the Superior Court bench by Gov. James Longley and served as a justice from 1977 to 1992.

Selected Bibliography

  • A History of Aurora, Maine (1958)
  • A Church has been Gathered: Hsitory of the First Congregational Church in Ellsworth (1962)
  • Ellsworth, Maine 1763-1963: Bicentennial Celebration July 20-July 27, 1963 (1963)
  • Memorable Justices and Lawyers of Maine: A Historical Perspective (2006)

Craig, Barbara ( - )

Genre: Mystery, Young Adult

Barbara Schestopol Craig, is a native of Brooklyn, New York. She received her undergraduate degree in English from the University of Maine at Farmington and her Master's Degree in Business Administration from Florida Metropolitan University where she graduated Magna Cum Laude. She has written many feature stories for the Lewiston Sun Journal, has several poems published and in 1998 was inducted into the International Society of Poets. She also taught in the Humanities Department at Central Maine Community College for 7 years. After living in several different U.S. regions she came to call Maine "home" as Maine is bountiful in history and nature, Barbara's greatest interests, which are reflected throughout the book. Barbara and her family live in Wilton, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Wilding House Mystery (2013)

Silverstein, Stuart ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Deciding against law school and a career with the FBI, Stu Silverstein finally got serious about his life, found a VW bus and took a driveabout across the country in search of "real" bread. Not finding any, he returned to Maine and started to bake his own. He also builds earth ovens, writes and makes art. Later on, he started a brick oven caf?, and along with some friends, founded Railroad Square Cinema, one of New England's best known art cinemas. Traveling to Guatemala each winter with Masons On A Mission, he builds energy efficient stoves with the Mayas. Stu also leads earth oven workshops back home. (from his website).

Selected Bibliography

  • Bread in Time: Breadbaking without Angst (1990)
  • Bread on Earth: Crafting the Primal Loaf (1994)

Simmons, Matthew (1943 - 2010)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Matthew R. Simmons was an investment banker and energy advisor who was one of the first to raise awareness of the unreliability of Middle East oil reserves and the idea of "Peak Oil." He was founder and chairman emeritus of Simmons & Company International, an investment banking firm catering to oil companies and served as an energy advisor to President George W. Bush. He died in North Haven.

Selected Bibliography

  • Twilight in the Desert: The Coming Saudi Oil Shock and the World Economy (2005)

Donnell, Mayra ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Mayra Donnell has a BA in History from the University of Maine, an MA in Education from Goddard College and is an elementary school teacher of Social Studies. In her past life, before returning to teaching, she ran a sustainable organic farm. Donnell lives on the coast of Maine in an old 1800s farm house, where she tends her flower garden and makes rose petal jam.

Selected Bibliography

  • 1816: The Year That Summer Never Came (2013)

Simmons, Walter ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Walter J. Simmons builds boats and carves decoys, teaches others to do so and writes and publishes books to teach both boatbuilding and carving. He lives in Lincolnville, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Lapstrake Boatbuilding (1978)
  • Building the 9'7" Maine Skiff (1980)
  • Building Lapstrake Canoes (1981)
  • Building "Sunshine" (1981)
  • Lines Lofting and Half Models (1991)
  • Pigeons and Gudgeons: An Illustrated Compendium of 1500 Terms and Phrases, Parts and Pieces, Tips, Tools and colloquialisms associated with the Business of Boatbuilding (1993)
  • Repairs (1995)
  • Glued Lap Construction: Instructions for Building a Duck Trap Wherry (1998)
  • Finishing (1999)
  • Wherries (2004)
  • The Rhodes Wherry (2004)
  • The Littlest Boats (2004)
  • The Newfoundland Trap Skiff (2004)
  • Duck Trap Wherry (2004)
  • Building the Christmas Wherry (2005)
  • Lapstrake Canoes (2006)

Locke, Carolyn (1949 - )

Genre: Poetry

Carolyn Locke was born and raised in Hudson, NH. She attended Bates College, graduating Phi Beta Kappa in 1971 and received her MFA in Creative Writing from Goddard College. She has taught language arts and English at Orono Junior High School and Mount View High School in Thorndike, ME. She was a semi-finalist for Maine Teacher of the Year, made a Fulbright Memorial Fund trip to Japan, a Fulbright-Hays Seminar in Morocco, two Primary Source trips to China and a Fulbright-Hays Special Projects trip to Japan.

Locke has published poetry in journals such as Puckerbrush Review, Off the Coast, Anthology of the Live Poets Society, Bangor Daily News, and The Cafe Review and has been a member of the Board of Directors of the Live Poets Society.

Selected Bibliography

  • Always This Falling: Poems (2010)
  • Not One Thing: Following Matsuo Basho's Narrow Road to the Interior (2013)

Sky, Harry (1924 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Rabbi Harry Sky served at the Temple Beth El in Portland for 30 years and as Rabbi Emeritus for another 20 years. He was a participant in the 1963 March on Washington, an active member of the Maine chapter of the NAACP, an advocate in the Greater Portland community for civil rights for gay persons, minorities, the physically challenged and the elderly. He was the driving force in the creation of the former Senior College at USM. An avid collector of Inuit art, he donated his collection to the Peary-MacMillan Arctic Museum and Arctic Studies Center at Bowdoin College.

Selected Bibliography

  • My Journey (2003)
  • Give Me Two Minutes of Your Time: Let's Have a Conservation (2005)
  • A Rabbi in Maine (2009)

Small, Abner (1836 - 1910)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Gardiner native Abner Ralph Small enlisted in Co. G of the Maine 3rd Infantry in June of 1861 at age 25. He saw battle at the first Battle of Bull Run and served as a recruitment officer. He was captured and made a prisoner-of-war in August of 1864 and returned to the Union as a result of a prisoner exchange. He wrote a diary while in prison and later a memoir of his time in service.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Sixteenth Maine Regiment in the War of the Rebellion, 1861-1865 (1886)
  • The Road to Richmond: The Civil War Memoirs of Major Abner R. Small of the Sixteenth Maine Volunteers (1939) The Road to Richmond in Google Books

Selected Resources

Alves, Josh (1982? - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Graphic designer and children's author/illustrator Josh Alves grew up in Rhode Island living upstairs from his influential grandparents. He attended high school in Bristol, RI and spent a year at Katharine Gibbs School studying visual communications. He has worked as a graphic arts technician at the Bangor Daily News as well as a comic strip artist with a couple of different strips running in the BDN. He is inspired by animation, drawing backgrounds as a separate layer then drawing the characters on top.

Selected Bibliography

Author/Illustrator

  • Lilly Bristol Dinosaur Wrangler and the Town a Tyrannosaurus Wrecks (2014)

Illustrator

  • Zeke Meeks Series written by Debra L. Green (2012, 2013)

Selected Resources

Small, Albion (1854 - 1926)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Albion Woodbury Small was born in Buckfield, ME, grew up in Bangor, attended Andover Newton Theological School studying Theology and the University of Leipzig and the University of Berlin studying German history, social economics and politics. He then studied history at Johns Hopkins University where he earned his Ph.D. At the same time, he taught at Colby College where he also served as president (1889-1892).

In 1892 while at the University of Chicago, he became the first professor of sociology and is widely recognized as the man who won recognition in the U.S. for sociology as an academic discipline.

He was founder (1895) and editor of the first consequential U.S. publication dealing with sociology -- American Journal of Sociology and (with George E. Vincent) he wrote the first sociology textbook.

Selected Bibliography

  • An Introduction to the Study of Society with George E. Vincent (1894)
  • American Journal of Sociology editor, 1895-1926
  • Between Eras from Capitalism to Democracy (1913)

Small, Constance (1901 - 2005)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Constance Scovill Small was born in Lubec, ME and wrote her one and only book at the age of 85. In it, she chronicled her life as the wife of a lighthouse keeper on the coast of Maine and New Hampshire.

She was known as the "First Lady of Light" and was the honorary chairperson of the Friends of Portsmouth Harbor Lighthouse, was active in the lighthouse preservation movement, and lectured widely about that nearly vanished way of life.

Bibliography

  • The Lighthouse Keeper's Wife (1986)

Small, David (1937 - )

Genre: General Fiction

David Small was born in Gardiner, ME, graduated from Carlisle High School (1955), studied at Hersey Junior College (AA, 1957), Boston University (1958) and Franklin & Marshall College (BS English 1960). He taught English in Fleischmanns and Camillus, NY from 1960-62 and worked as a radio announcer in Palmyra from 1962-63. He was an Associate Executive Vice President of the Pennsylvania Medical Society and has taught literature and creative writing at Franklin & Marshall College.

Selected Bibliography

  • The River in Winter (1987)
  • Alone: A Novel (1991)

Selected Resources

Becksvoort, Christian (1949 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Author and fine wood craftsman Christian Becksvoort was born in Wolfsburg, Germany and grew up in Wheaton, MD, graduated from the University of Maine in 1972, and has resided in New Gloucester, ME since 1976.

Best known as an expert in the Shaker style of wooden furniture, he has written several books about building Shaker furniture as well as countless articles for Fine Woodworking Magazine where he has been the senior contributing editor since 1990.

Selected Bibliography

  • How to Build Shaker Furniture (with Thos. Moser) (1977)
  • In Harmony with Wood (1983)
  • The Shaker Legacy: Perspectives on an Enduring Furniture Style (1998)
  • With the Grain: A Craftsman's Guide to Understanding Wood (2013)

Selected Resources

Kinney, Emily ( - )

Genre: Young Adult

Emily Kinney is a native Mainer, born in Bath and raised in Limerick where she continues to live. She has been an avid reader and story-creator all her life (even before she could wield a pencil). She has always wanted to write a novel and did so -- her first was published in 2012.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Island of Lote (2012)

Selected Resources

Smart, Harold (1892 - 1979)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Harold Smart was born in Searsport, ME, attended local schools there, then graduated from Kent's Hill Seminary (1909). He received his Bachelor of Science at Wesleyan University (1915) then served in the U.S. Army during WWI, and studied at the University of Lyons in 1918. He received his MA (1921) and his Ph.D. (1923) at Cornell where he spent nearly all of his academic career as a member of the faculty in the Sage School of Philosophy. From 1930 to 1937, he was an editor of The Philosophical Review.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Philosophical Presuppositions of Mathematical Logic (1925)
  • The Logic of Science (1931)
  • An Introductory Logic by James Edwin Creighton (1932) (totally revised and updated by Harold R. Smart)

Smith, Abbot (1906 - 1983)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Abbot E. Smith was born in Portland, ME. He attended Coburn Classical Institute in Waterville, Colby College, Harvard, was a Rhodes Scholar attending Balliol College Oxford where he received his Ph.D. He taught at Bard College, Columbia University. After Pearl Harbor, he joined the Navy and served in Europe as a Civilian Affairs Officer, on the U.S. Control Council in Vienna and in 1948 joined the CIA and an Intelligence Analyst.

Selected Bibliography

  • James Madison: Builder; A New Estimate of a Memorable Career (1937)
  • Colonists in Bondage: White Servitude and Convict Labor in America, 1607-1776 (1947)

Selected Resources

Smith, Alicia (1913 - 1992)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Alicia Kay Smith was born in Union, ME, lived in Sanford, Portland and Augusta, graduating from Cony High School. She attended Farmington State Normal School and Oak Grove Seminary in Vassalboro. She published her first book of poetry while in her twenties.

Selected Bibliography

  • Tall Children (1934)
  • Over the Moon's Edge (1938)
  • Good Night, Little Elf: [Poems] (1943)
  • Only in Whispers (1947)
  • From the Mayflower to Maine: The Ancestors and Descendents of David Vinal Smith, 1835-1915 (1994)

Smith, Francis (1887 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Author and poet Francis N. (McKelden) Smith was born in Washington DC and lived in Damariscotta, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Written on Water: And Other Verse (1956)
  • A Couple of Businessmen and Other Writings: One Man's Literary Cornucopia (1958)
  • Trial by Fire: A Suspense Novel (1959)
  • Letters to Maloney, Et Al (1960)
  • More Letters to Maloney, Et Al (1962)
  • South of Yesterday: The Memoirs of Francis McKelden Smith (1964)

Selected Resources

Smith, Danny ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Author, genealogist and historian Danny Smith has been historian for his hometown of Gardiner ME and served as Chairman of the Gardiner Public Library Association's Special Collections Committee.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Origin of Temple (1969)
  • The Temple Annals of Maine: A Genealogy of Levi Temple, Our Revolutionary War Ancestor with a Record of his Progeny to 1972 (1972)
  • The Rise of the Temples: A Millennium of Power & Progress, 716 A.D. to the Present, & Genealogy (1973)
  • Genealogy of the Temple Family of Stowe, Buckinghamshire, England and Their Coats of Arms (1973)
  • Smith Family of Mt. Vernon, Maine and Descendants (1973)
  • Gardiner's Yellow House: a Tribute to the Richards Family... (1988)
  • The Yellow House Papers: The Laura E. Richards Collection: An Inventory and Historical Analysis (1991)
  • Gardiner on the Kennebec with Earle G. Shettleworth, Jr. (1996)
  • Gardiner with Earle G. Shettleworth, Jr. (2008)

Smith, David (1929 - 2009)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

David C. Smith was born in Lewiston, ME, graduated from South Paris High School in 1947 and enlisted in the Navy the next year, graduated from Farmington State Teachers College, earned master's degrees in education and history and government from the University of Maine, and earned his doctorate at Cornell University.

He was Bird & Bird professor emeritus of American History at the University of Maine and was widely known as an expert in historic climatology and climate change as well as one of the foremost scholars in the life and work of H. G. Wells. His books on the history of the University of Maine and on papermaking in Maine are considered the seminal works on both subjects.

According to his obituary, in his lifetime, he gave more than 20 invited lectures at universities in Europe, Canada and the U.S., wrote of edited more than 30 books, and had more than 125 scholarly articles published.

Selected Bibliography

  • History of Lumbering in Maine 1860-1930 (1965)
  • History of Papermaking in the United States (1691-1969) (1971)
  • Lumbering and the Maine Woods: A Bibliographical Guide (1971)
  • The First Century: A History of the University of Maine, 1865-1965 (1979)
  • H. G. Wells: Desperately Mortal: A Biography (1986)
  • Growing Season parameter: Reconstructions for New England Using Killing Frost Records, 1697-1947 (1996)

Wright, Virginia (1955 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Virginia M. Wright is an award-winning journalist specializing in in-depth magazine features. She was born in Ellwood City, Pa. and grew up near Boston, MA and has a bachelor of arts degree from McGill University in Montreal, where she majored in English. She has lived in Maine since 1981 and now calls Camden home. She has been the senior writer and editor for Down East magazine since 2010 and she has authored five books for Down East Books. She is the former features editor of the Times Record in Brunswick.

Selected Bibliography

  • Red's Eats: World's Best Lobster Shack (2010)
  • The Wild Blueberry Book (2011)
  • The Maine Lobster Book (2012)
  • Route 1 Maine (2013)
  • Ultimate Acadia: 50 Reasons to Visit Maine's National Park (2013)

Bibber, Joyce (1934 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Joyce Bibber was born and raised in Harpswell, ME, educated at Westbrook Junior College (AA), Barnard College (AB), and Stanford University (MA, PhD). She was a member of the history department at GSC/UMPG/USM, 1967-1999 and has worked with the Advisory Service of Greater Portland Landmarks, 1978-present.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Home for Everyman: The Greek Revival and Maine Domestic Architecture (1989)
  • Brunswick and Topsham (1994)
  • Bath and West Bath (1995)
  • Harpswell (1996)
  • Selected Maine Coast Postcards of George S. Graves (1998)
  • University of Southern Maine (2001)
  • Portland (2007) with Earle Shettleworth
  • Westbrook College Campus (2009)
  • Living with Newer Old Houses with Thomas Hinkle, Jon Hall and Patricia Webber(2013)

Hunt, H. ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

H. Draper Hunt was born in Boston, educated at Harvard and Columbia University (PhD). He was a member of the history department at UMP/UMPG/USM (1965-1997) and has lived in South Portland since 1966.

Selected Bibliography

  • Hannibal Hamlin of Maine: Lincoln's First Vice President (1969)
  • The Blaine House: Home of Maine's Governors (1974)
  • Educating a President: Abraham Lincoln and Learning, 1809-1854 (1983)
  • Dearest Father: the civil War Letters of Lt. Frank Dickerson, a Son of Belfast, Maine (1992)

Albee, Parker ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Parker B. Albee was born in Boston, educated at Dartmouth College and Duke University (PhD) and was a member of the history department at UMP/UMPG/USM from 1966-1993.

Selected Bibliography

  • Shadows of Surabachi: Raising the Flags on Iwo Jima (1995)
  • Letters from Sea, 1882-1901: Joanna and Lincoln Colcord's Seafaring Childhood (1999)

Eastman, Joel ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Joel W. Eastman was born in Maine, educated at the University of Maine, Portland and the University of Florida (PhD). He was a member of the history department at UMP/UMPG/USM and has written numerous pamphlets on Maine as well as several books.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Maine Thing: Some of Our Best Friends are Republicans (1964)
  • A History of the Katahdin Iron Works (1965)
  • A History of Sears Island, Searsport, Maine (1976)
  • The Credit Union Movement in Maine: A History of the Maine Credit Union League, 1937-1988 (1988)
  • The Modern Defenses of the Coast of Maine, 1891-1945 (1988)
  • Maine: The Pine Tree State from Prehistory to the Present (1995) with Richard W. Judd and Edwin A. Churchill
  • The Peaks Island Military Reservation Trail, 1942-1946 (2000) with Kimberly A. MacIsaac
  • Harbor Forts: A Look Behind the Walls, 1775-1945 (2006)

Howe, Stanley ( - )

Genre:

Stanley R. Howe grew up in Bethel, ME and was educated at Gorham State College. He served as the director of the Bethel Historical Society's Moses Mason House, 1975-2013.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dr. Moses Mason and His House (1981)
  • A Fair Field and No Favor: A concise Hsitory of the Maine State Grange (1994)
  • Bethel, Maine: A Brief History (2009)

Barnes, Jack ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Jack Barnes was born in Sebago, ME and a graduate of North Dakota College at Dickenson and USM. He taught at various Maine schools, retiring after 25 years at Bonny Eagle High School and lives in Hiram, ME. For many years, he wrote largely for local magazines and has collaborated with his wife Diane Barnes on several books about area towns.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Oxford Hills: Greenwood, Norway, Oxford, Paris, West Paris and Woodstock (1995) with Diane Barnes
  • Maine Life: At the Turn of the Century: Through the Photographs of Nettie Cummings Maxim (1995) with Diane Barnes
  • The Sebago Lake Area: Windham, Standish, Raymond, Casco, Sebago, and Naples (1996) with Diane Barnes
  • The Best of Barnes: The Selected Articles and Photographs of Jack Barnes (1996)
  • Lake Region: Bridgton, Harrison, Otisfield, Waterford, and Bridgton and Saco River Railroad (1998) with Diane Barnes
  • Sebago Lake, West Shore: Standish, Baldwin, Sebago, and Naples (2000) with Diane Barnes
  • Upper Saco River Valley: Fryeburg, Lovell, Brownfield, Denmark, and Hiram (2002) with Diane Barnes

Hanna, David ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Round Pond native David Hanna is a graduate of USM and earned his master's degree from NYU. He has taught at schools in New York, Japan and Brazil and currently resides in Madison, NJ.

Selected Bibliography

  • Knights of the Sea: The True Story of the Boxer and the Enterprise and the War of 1812 (2012)

Smith, Diane (1949 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Diane Monroe Smith is a Maine native, born in Lubec, who received her BS from the University of Maine and is a retired social worker. She has written several books about the Civil War.

Selected Bibliography

  • Fanny and Joshua: The Enigmatic Lives of Frances Caroline Adams and Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain (1999)
  • Chamberlain at Petersburg: The Charge at Fort Hell, June 18, 1864 (2004)
  • Command Conflicts in Grant's Overland Campaign: Ambition and Animosity in the Army of the Potomac (2013)

Smith, Margaret (1897 - 1995)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Margaret Chase Smith was born and raised in Skowhegan, MEand graduated from Skowhegan High School. She taught briefly at the one-room Pitts School near Skowhegan, worked as an executive for the Maine Telephone and Telegraph Company then for the Independent Reporter the weekly Skowhegan newspaper where she met her future husband and Maine Congressman Clyde Smith. When her husband died, she was elected to fill his seat and became the first woman from Maine elected to Congress. In 1947, she became the first woman to represent Maine in the Senate and the first woman to serve in both houses of Congress. She is best-known for her "Declaration of Conscience" during the McCarthy era and for always wearing a red rose.

Selected Bibliography

  • Gallant Women (1968) with H. Paul Jeffers
  • Declaration of Conscience (1972)

Smith, Marion (1899 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Marion Jaques Smith attended school in West Bath and Morse High School in Bath; Gorham Normal School and the University of Maine (B.S.). She taught school for many years prior to her writing career.

Selected Bibliography

  • A History of Maine: From Wilderness to Statehood (1949)
  • Little Black Bear and the Path That Grew Up (1952)
  • Little Black Bear's Adventures on the Way to Moosehead Lake (1953)
  • Little Black Bear's Adventures on Twelve-Rod Road (1953)
  • Brief History of Education in Bath, Maine (1957)
  • On the Way North: A Mother Bear's Troubled Trip (1967)
  • Pokey and timothy of Stonehouse Farm (1973)
  • General William King: Merchant, Shipbuilder and Maine's First Governor (1980)

Selected Resources

Smith, Marion (1901 - 2004)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Marion Whitney Smith was born and raised in Boston and West Newton, MA. She graduated from Miss Herman's Secretarial School in Boston and studied writing at the Palmer Institute of Authorship. In 1930, her husband was offered a job in Maine and they moved to Millinocket. She researched and wrote extensively throughout her life.

Selected Bibliography

  • Katahdin Fantasies: Stories Based on Old Indian Legends (1953)
  • algonquian and Abenaki Indian: Myths and Legends (1962)
  • Strange Tales of Abenaki Shamanism (1963)
  • Thoreau's West Branch Guides (1971)
  • Thoreau's Moosehead & Chesuncook Guides(Attean and Polis) (1972)
  • Beacon Hill's Colonel Robert Gould Shaw (1986)
  • colonel Robert Gould Shaw, A Pictorial History: His Family Background and Shaw's Brave Massachusetts 54th Volunteer Infantry (1990)

Smith, Nora (1859 - 1934)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Nora Archibald Smith worked with her sister Kate Douglas Wiggin as a children's author and as members of the "Kindergarten Movement" opening a kindergarten training center together in California. She also worked as a teacher in Arizona. She and her sister retired to Quillcote, the family home in Hollis, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Children's Rights: A Book of Nursery Logic (1892) with Kate Douglas Wiggin
  • Froebel's Gifts (1895) with Kate Douglas Wiggin
  • Kindergarten Principles and Practice (1896) with Kate Douglas Wiggin
  • Froebel's Occupations (1896) with Kate Douglas Wiggin
  • The Children of the Future (1898)
  • Under the Cactus Flag: A Story of Life in Mexico (1899)
  • The Message of Froebel, and other Essays (1900)
  • The Story Hour: A Book for the Home and the Kindergarten (1890) with Kate Douglas Wiggin
  • Nelson, the Adventurer: A Story for Boys (1906)
  • Kate Douglas Wiggin as Her Sister Knew Her (1925)
  • The Home-Made Kindergarten (1928)

Selected Resources

Smith, Walter (1858 - 1939)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Walter Brown Smith was born in Hampden, ME. He was a geologist for the USGS in Colorado (1884-1889) and worked as an archaeologist in Maine from 1906-1929. He was also a founder and the first curator of the Abbe Museum at Acadia National Park.

Selected Bibliography

  • Indian Remains of the Penobscot Valley and Their Significance (1926)
  • The Jones Cove Shell-Heap at West Gouldsboro, Maine (1929)
  • The Lost Red Paint People of Maine: A Few Things We Think We Know About Them and More That We Know We Don't (1930)

Selected Resources

Snow, Ralph (1934 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Ralph Linwood Smith spent much of his childhood on Cape Cod. He served in the Navy during the Korean War, then received his undergraduate degree in history from the University of Massachusetts and his graduate degree from Wesleyan University. He taught, then worked in education administration, then became a part-time historian for the National Park Service. In the early 1970's, he moved to Maine and worked as the director of the Bath Marine Museum for nine years. After serving as director of the Maritime Museum Association of San Diego, he returned to Maine and began researching for his first book. He has also written articles published by the National Trust for Historic Preservation and Woodenboat.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bath Iron Works: The First Hundred Years (1987)
  • Maine Odyssey: Good Times and Hard Times in Bath, 1936-1986 (1988) with Kenneth R. Martin
  • The Pattens of Bath: A Seagoing Dynasty (1996) with Kenneth R. Martin
  • A Shipyard in Maine: Percy & Small and the Great Schooners (1998) with Douglas K. Lee

Solmitz, David (1943 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

David O. Solmitz grew up in Brunswick, ME and attended Bowdoin College, graduating in 1965. He is a teacher, idealist and author.

Selected Bibliography

  • Schooling for Humanity: When Big Brother Isn't Watching (2001)
  • Piecing Scattered Souls: Maine, Germany, Mexico, China and Beyond (2011)

Soule, Bertha (1863 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Bertha Louise Soule was born and raised in Bath, ME. She graduated from Colby College (1885), taught in several schools and lived in Brooklyn, NY.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Joyous Traveler and Other Poems (1934)
  • Colby's Roman, Julian Daniel Taylor (1938)
  • Where No Fear Was (1941)
  • Colby's President Roberts (1943)
  • Again the Vision: [Poems] (?)

Selected Resources

Soule, Deb ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Deb Soule is an apothecary, herbalist and gardener who lives in Rockport, ME. She studied at the College of the Atlantic and in Nepal.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Roots of Healing: A Woman's Book of Herbs (1995)
  • The Woman's Handbook of Healing Herbs: A Guide to Natural Remedies (2011)
  • How to Move Like a Gardener: Planting and Preparing Medicines from Plants (2013)

Soule, Harris (1900 - 1971)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Harris W. Soule was born in Fairfield, VT and graduated from the University of Vermont in 1922. He worked as a Windsor County Agent and for the Vermont Extension Service, as well as for the USDA. He wrote numerous articles for New England Magazines and newspapers.

Bibliography

  • Northwoods Tales and Unusual Recipes (1971)

Southgate, Horatio (1812 - 1894)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Horatio Southgate was born in Portland, ME, studied for the ministry at Andover Theological Seminary the was ordained as an Episcopal priest. He acted as missionary in the Ottoman Empire in Turkey, Iran, Iraq and other parts of the Middle East. Upon his return to the U.S., he served as rector of Saint Luke's Church in Portland, ME, Church of the Advent, in Boston and the Zion Church in New York City.

Selected Bibliography

  • Narrative of a Tour Through Armenia, Kurdistan, Persia and Mesopotamia: With An Introduction, and Occasional Observations Upon the Condition of Mohammedanism and Christianity in Those Countries (1840)
  • Narrative of a Visit to the Syrian [Jacobite] Church of Mesopo Tamia: With Statements and Reflections.... (1844)

Spadola, Meema ( - )

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, Non-Fiction

Meema Spadola grew up in Searsmont, ME and graduated from Sarah Lawrence College. She is an independent documentary film maker, author, and postpartum doula, living in Brooklyn, NY. Her radio documentaries have appeared on Public Radio's This American Life and she has produced documentaries for PBS, HBO, Cinemax, Sundance Channel and NPR.

Selected Bibliography

  • Breasts: Our Most Public Private Parts (1998)

Selected Filmography

  • Breasts: A Documentary HBO Films (1996)
  • Our House: A Very Real Documentary About Kids of Gay & Lesbian Parents Icarus Films (2000)

Spalding, James (1846 - 1938)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

James Alfred Spalding was born in Portsmouth NH. He received his AB at Dartmouth (1866) and his MD at Harvard (1870). Because of his hearing impairment, he studied ophthalmology and otology in Europe opening his practice in Portland, ME in 1873. Because of his knowledge of several languages, he worked as a translator of European articles in his field for the Archives of Ophthalmology, a journal out of New York. He was a member of the American Ophthalmological Society and contributed several papers to the Society.

Selected Bibliography

Selected Papers Presented to the American Ophthalmological Society

  • A Case of Sympathetic Neuroretinitis (1883)
  • Optic Atrophy from Blows on the Forehead and Temple (1900)
  • Tuberculosis of the Eye (1903)
  • Cases of Eyestrain (Astigmatism and Phorias) (1907)

Books

  • Life of Lyman Spalding (1916)
  • Maine Physicians of 1820 (1928)

Spear, Ellis (1834 - 1918)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Ellis Spear was born and raised on the family farm in Warren, ME. He attended a Presbyterian church Sunday school, then graduated from Bowdoin College in 1858 where he remained as a teacher for several years. When the Civil War broke out, he was commissioned as a captain but quickly rose through the ranks to that of general. He was at Appomattox Courthouse to witness the surrender of Lee to Grant, ending the war. He then became a patent attorney and U.S. Commissioner of Patents and wrote about the war. He was buried with honors at Arlington National Cemetery.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Civil War Recollections of General Ellis Spear (1997) with Abbott Spear

Spectre, Peter ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Peter H. Spectre has been editor of Maine Boats, Homes & Harbors magazine since 1999. He is also former editor of WoodenBoat magazine and of International Marine Publishing Company as well as the author of several books. He lives and writes in Spruce Head, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Mariner's Catalog (serial)
  • The Down East companion: A Compendium of Interesting & Informative Miscellanea (1979)
  • On the Hawser: A Tugboat Album with Steven Lang (1980)
  • Different Waterfronts: Stories from the Wooden Boat Revival (1989)
  • A Passage in Time: Along the Coast of Maine By Schooner (1991)
  • Wooden Ship: The Art, History, and Revival of Wooden Boatbuilding with David Larkin (1991)
  • The Goodly Ship: The Building of the Susan Constant with David Larkin (1992)
  • The Expectant Father's Cradle Boat Book (1993)

Spiess, Arthur ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Dr. Arthur Spiess received a Ph.D. in Anthropology from Harvard University in 1978. Since 1978 he has worked as an archaeologist for the Maine Historic Preservation Commission, and is currently the Senior Archaeologist on staff.

Selected Bibliography

  • Reindeer and Caribou Hunters: An Archaeological Study (1979)
  • Kidder Point and Sears Island in Prehistory with Mark H. Hedden (1983)
  • Michaud, a Paleoindian Site in the New England-Maritimes Region with Deborah Brush Wilson (1987)
  • The Turner Farm Fauna: 5000 Years of Hunting and Fishing in Penobscot Bay, Maine (2001)

Spiller, Burton (1886 - 1973)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Burton L. Spiller was considered the foremost expert on grouse hunting in the 20th century. He was born in Portland, ME in 1886 and began hunting at an early age. He married and moved to East Rochester, NH where he was close enough to the Maine border that he could hunt both states. Though he left school after the 8th grade, he was a gifted writer and contributed articles about ruffed grouse to publications such as Field & Stream, National Sportsman, Hunting & Fishing, and Outdoors. He wrote several books including Grouse Feathers which is widely considered to be the best book ever written on the topic.

Selected Bibliography

  • Grouse Feathers (1935)
  • Firelight (1937)
  • Drummer in the Woods (1962)
  • Fishin' Around (1974)

Sprague, John (1848 - 1926)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

John Francis Sprague was born in Sangerville, ME. He was a member of the Piscataquis County Bar and practiced law in Abbott and Monson, then Dover, ME. He served as a representative to the Legislature from Piscataquis County and as the President of the Piscataquis Historical Society and the Bangor Historical Society. He wrote about Maine history.

Selected Bibliography

  • Piscataquis Biography and Fragments (1899)
  • Sebastian Rale: A Maine Tragedy of the Eighteenth Century (1906)
  • The North Eastern Boundary Controversy and the Aroostook War (1910)
  • Historical Collections of Piscataquis County, Maine, Consisting of Papers Read at Meetings... (1910)
  • Backwoods Sketches (1912)
  • Jackman and the Moose River Region (1915)
  • Maine One Hundred Years, 1820-1920 (1920)
  • Sprague's Journal of Maine History (1913-1926)

Stadig, Rita (1927 - 2013)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Rita B. Stadig was the daughter of a game warden and lived in Soldier Pond, ME. She attended Fort Kent High School and received her B.S. from the University of Fort Kent (1964). She won several ski championships in both the U.S. and Canada during the 1950's and taught history for several years.

Selected Bibliography

  • Our Maine Heritage: 1497 to 1920 (1982)
  • The Ski Marathoners (1987)
  • The St. John Valley Story and the Wallagrass Story (1989)
  • Aroostook War: The Little Lake Fort is Located (1994)

Selected Resources

Stanwood, Edward (1841 - 1923)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Edward Stanwood was born in Augusta, Maine. He was an historian, newpaper and magazine editor, correspondent and author. He graduated from Bowdoin College in 1861 and was Assistant editor (and later editor) of the Boston Daily Advertiser (1867-1883), managing editor of the Youth's Companion(1887-1911), and editor for America of the Stateman's Year Book. He was a trustee of Bowdoin College for many years and recording secretary of the Massachusetts Historical Society from 1905 until his death. He served as secretary for one year for James G. Blaine, and wrote for the American Statesman's series and other publications. He died in Brookline, Massachusetts.

Selected Bibliography

  • a History of the Presidency from 1788 to 1897
  • American Tariff Controversies in the Nineteenth Century (1903)
  • James Gillespie Blaine (1905)

Selected Resources

Staples, Walter (1913 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Walter Staples was a retired researcher for a major New England poultry breeding company, a retired blueberry farmer, and an avid trout fisherman. He published numerous poems, short stories, and articles in newspapers and magazines.

Selected Bibliography

  • The North Bay Narrative (1998)
  • Blueberryland: Taming the Maine Wild Lowbush Blueberry (2003)

Stapleton, Patience (1861 - 1893)

Genre: General Fiction

Patience Tucker Stapleton was born in Wiscasset, ME, educated at Farmington, ME and the Moravian Seminary in Bethlehem, PA and moved to Denver, CO in 1881 to accept a position at the daily newspaper. She married William Stapleton, the editor of the Denver Republican in 1883. She published stories in various periodicals.

Selected Bibliography

  • Trailing Yew: A Story of Monhegan (1921)
  • Island Light: Monhegan Island (2007)

Brown, Wenzell (1912 - 1981)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Born in Portland, ME, Wenzell Brown graduated from Portland High School in 1928, attended both Bowdoin and the University of Maine for one year, graduated from Rollins College in 1932 (A.B.), attended King's College, London (1932-33), and received his M.A. from Columbia University in 1940. He taught for many years in such diverse locations such as the public schools of Puerto Rico and Lingnan University in Canton, China. He was in Hong Kong when the city fell to the Japanese and spent several months in an internment camp for foreigners. He wrote both fiction and non-fiction.

Selected Bibliography

  • Hong Kong Aftermath (1943)
  • Dynamite on Our Doorstep: Puerto Rican Paradox (1945)
  • Dark Drums (1950)
  • Women Who Died in the Chair (1958) Edgar Award Winner

Asch, Chris (1973 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Chris Myers Asch moved to Maine in 2013 from his hometown of Washington, D.C. when his wife became rabbi of Temple Beth El in Augusta. A graduate of Duke University with a Ph.D. in American History from the University of North Carolina, he is an alumnus of Teach For America and an Echoing Green Fellow. He co-founded the Sunflower County Freedom Project in 1998 and the U.S. Public Service Academy initiative in 2006. He and his wife, Erica, have three children and live in Hallowell.

Selected Bibliography

  • Chocolate City: A History of Race and Democracy in the Nation's Capital (2017)
  • The Senator and the Sharecropper: The Freedom Struggles of James O. Eastland and Fannie Lou Hamer- (2011)

Hamilton, Henry (1945 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Retired from a career as international humanitarian aid and development professional, Henry H. Hamilton, III returned to his hometown of Otisfield, ME where he runs a hobby farm. From 1989 to 1995 he was a story teller on WLRH-FM, Alabama Public Radio, Huntsville, AL, broadcasting some 100 original stories. He published my first book in November 2013, a collection of spooky rhymes for children, featuring wonderful illustrations by artist Patricia Chandler of Norway, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Night Full Frightfull (2013)

Webber, Kate (1989 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Kate Webber earned a degree in anthropology from Bates College, with concentrations in Environment, Place and History and Medieval Worlds. Kate worked with the Freeport Historical Society before spending two years with the Swan's Island Historical Society through the Island Institute's fellow program. Her varied historical work and social life on the island led to a column in the publication Working Waterfront. Kate has since moved to Portland, Maine, and is working for the Maine Humanities Council.

Selected Bibliography:

  • Swan's Island Chronicles: Borrowed, Exaggerated and Half-forgotten Tales of Island Life (2014)

Guillard, Ruth (0931 - )

Genre: Poetry

Ruth Fredericks Guillard was born in Philadelphia, PA. She spent much of her childhood wandering the woods and creeks behind her home and exploring the sands of Long Beach Island, N.J. She graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1952 with a BFA degree after majoring in music in the Department of Fine Arts. Guillard has had a career in the New England area as a performing musician, (voice and recorder), specializing in Renaissance and Baroque music. She taught recorder at the Cape Cod Conservatory of Arts and Music. In 1974, she became a certified teacher of the Transcendental Meditation Program and has taught TM in Massachusetts, Maine, Russia and Armenia. Her poems spring from these life experiences, manifested in rhythmic cadences, references to nature and deep, sometimes playful, dives into the many layers of life.

Selected Bibliography

  • From Burnham Cove (2012) with John B. Stimson
  • Of Time and Tides (2013)
  • On a Fair Wind (2013) with John B. Stimson

Starbird, Charles (1898 - 1967)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Charles Millard Starbird was born, in the Danville section of Auburn, where his ancestors were early settlers. He graduated from Edward Little High School in 1917 and Bates College in 1921. He attended Yale University Law School intended to enter the practice of law. Instead he served as tax collector for the city of Auburn from 1923 to 1928 and later engaged in the contracting and carpentry trades. Near the end of his life he was an income tax accountant. He Was especiallt interested in historical research of the Pejepscot or Danville section of Auburn. His books on the native americans of the Androscoggin and the Kennebec (manuscript only) Valleys were considrered definitive works.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Indians of the Androscoggin Valley: Tribal History, and the Relations with the Early English Settlers of Maine (1928)
  • History of Danville as Told by the Town Records of Pjepscot & Danville, ME 1802-1866 (1960)

Selected Resources

Stearns, Helen (1909 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Non-Fiction

When Helen Meinardi worked as a screenwriter in Hollywood during the 1930's, she summered in Maine on farm she owned in Searsmont. After Hollywood, she then worked as a news writer for CBS in New York City. She finally moved to Maine for good in 1979 and took up residence in Camden. She then started Cricketfield Press and began writing and publishing her own books.

Selected Bibliography

Screenplays

  • Our Blushing Brides (1930)
  • I Met Him in Paris (1937)

Books

  • The Ladies' Aid Cook Book: A Collection of Kitchen-Tested Recipes Prepared by the Ladies Aid Society of the Congregational Church, Lovell, Maine (1983)
  • A Nice Place to Live (1984)
  • Breezy (1984)

Steele, William ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

William Paul Steele is a working actor who has appeared in hundreds of industrial films and videos. His acting experience ranges from summer stock to weather announcing, talk shows to commercials. In addition to being on the theatre faculty at the University of Southern Maine, Steele has been a drama critic for the Portland Press Herald, a theatre columnist for the Maine Sunday Telegram, and co-host of the Maine Public Broadcasting TV show "Power and Steele on Theater". He lives in Falmouth, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Character of Melodrama: An Examination through Dion Boucicault's The Poor of New York including the text of the play (1968)
  • Stay Home and Star!: A Step-by-Step Guide to Starting your Regional Acting Career in Commercials, Industrials, Theatre, Movies, Print Modeling, Newscasting, Radio and Television Reporting (1992)
  • Acting in Industrials: The Business of Acting for Business (1994)

Stevens, John (1820 - 1895)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Minister and author John Leavitt Stevens was born in Mount Vernon and lived most of his life in Augusta, ME. He attended Maine Wesleyan Seminary preparing for a career as a Universalist minister as which he served for ten years, becoming a leader in the anti-slavery movement. He left the ministry for a career in newspaper publishing and politics. He partnered with James G. Blaine in purchasing and editing the Kennebec Journal and developing the Republican Party in Maine. He moved into a diplomatic career as a member of the Department of State serving in Paraguay, Uruguay, Sweden and Norway, then finally to Hawai'i. During his tenure in Hawai'i, he was instrumental in an illegal attempt to overthrow Queen Lili'uokalani and her government and an attempt to annex Hawaii as a U. S. Territory in 1893. Stevens resigned his office, was forced into retirement and returned to Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • History of Gustavus Adolphus (1884)
  • Picturesque Hawaii: A Charming Description of Her Unique History, Strange People, Exquisite Climate.... (1894)

Stevens, Louis (1930? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Louis E. Stevens began his career as a cub reporter for the Piscataquis Observer while still in school. He went on to become a school teacher, then a staff writer for the Piscatiquis Observer writing an award-winning weekly column called "Louis Stevens Observes". He has written several books on the history of Dover-Foxcroft, sports at Foxcroft Academy and other topics of Maine history.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dover-Foxcroft: A History (1995)
  • 100 Years of Foxcroft Academy Football (1996)
  • Booming!: Dover and Foxcroft from 1881-1892 (1996)
  • Foxcroft Academy's Five Undefeated Football Teams (1996)
  • 200 Years of Dover-Foxcroft History (1999)

Fiske, David (1954 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

David Fiske was born in Bangor, and grew up in several New England states, including Maine. He graduated from Bangor High School, received his B.A. from Cornell University, and his M.L.S. from the University at Albany. He is a retired librarian, currently living in New York State.

Selected Bibliography

  • Solomon Northup: His Life Before and After Slavery (2012)
  • Solomon Northup: The Complete Story of the Author of Twelve Years a Slave (2013)
  • Ballston Spa History Walkaround (2013)
  • Forgotten on the Kennebec: Abandoned Places and Quirky People (2014)
  • Madame Sherri - The Special Edition (2014)

Stewart, Pat ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Pat Stewart is a graduate of Douglass College, Rutgers University and holds Masters and Doctoral Degrees from Harvard University. She taught at the high school, college and graduate level and then began career as a management development executive at large companies including Fidelity Investments and Thomas Cook Travel. After retiring she studied at the Museum of Fine Arts and co-authored a book on decorative painting. She has a studio in her home on Indian Pond in Greenwood, Maine where she paints and writes.

Selected Bibliography

  • Brush, Sponge, Stamp: A Creative Guide to Painting Beautiful Patterns on Everyday Surfaces with Paula DeSimone ((1998)
  • Mollyockett (2003)

Stewart, Ronald ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Ronald Stewart is of Scottish descent and Canadian roots and grew up in Madawaska, Maine. He went to schools in Edmundston, New Brunswick, and earned his bachelor of arts degree in public management. His university work was interrupted by his service in the U.S. Navy during World War II. He became Madawaska's town manager when he was in his mid-20s, beginning a lifetime of public service, including city manager in Brewer. He was a volunteer with the Maine Ombudsman Program, which has trained advocates that help consumers deal with problems associated with long-term care.

Selected Bibliography

  • Land of the Porcupine: Growing Up in Madawaska (2004)

Stilphen, George (1935 - 2018)

Genre: Non-Fiction

George Albert Stilphen was born in Portland and grew up in Scarborough. He was at various times in his life a millwright, a gunsmith, and made and sold harpsichords. He attended the University of New Hampshire, earning a Bachelor of Arts in music and two masters in musicology and music history. He was a beekeeper and a grower of heirloom apples, as well. At the end of his life, he lived in South Paris, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • The apples of Maine : a compilation of the history, physical and cultural characteristics of all the varieties of apples known to have been grown in the state of Maine (1993)

Stockford, Marjorie (1957 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Portland resident Marjorie Stockford grew up in and around Portland, ME. She received her BS in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MBA New York University, Stern School of Business, and MPA Harvard University Kennedy School of Government. She is a writer and consultant.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Bellwomen: The Story of the Landmark AT&T Sex Discrimination Case (2004)

Stone, Amy (1876 - 1938)

Genre: Children's Literature

Amy Wentworth Stone was born in Danvers, MA. She earned her A.B. at Vassar College (1898. Phi Beta Kappa). She lived in Massachusetts for most of her life but owned a cottage in New Harbor, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Here's Juggins (1936)
  • Treasure for Debby (1936)
  • Let Polly Do It (1937)

Selected Resources

Stone, William (1931 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

William F. Stone was born in Camden and lives in Bangor, ME. He earned his BA from the University of Maine, Orono 1956; his MA (1961) and his Ph.D. (1963) from the University of Florida, Gainesville. He taught at Wilson and Lafayette Colleges in Philadelphia and is Professor of Psychology Emeritus at the the University of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Psychology of Politics (1974)

Selected Resources

Keller, Jon ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Jon Keller holds an MFA from Boise State University. After graduate school, he moved to the coast of Maine and spent several years working aboard a lobster boat and writing for a commercial fishing newspaper. Now a clam digger, he divides his time between Maine and Montana.

Selected Bibliography

  • Of Sea and Cloud (2014)

Stone, William (1891 - )

Genre: General Fiction

William Leete Stone was a native of Wisconsin, lived in New York for a time and was a reporter, actor, artist's model and author. He wrote for some of the larger, western newspapers including Redlands Daily Review and the Des Moines Capital, then worked in advertising in New York and Chicago and later joined the Hull House Players, a semi-professional drama group under the auspices of Jane Addams. He took a turn on the professional stage in New York before he finally began writing short stories and novels. He moved to Freeport with his parents when they retired.

Selected Bibliography

  • Underwood Pythias (1934)
  • Golden Fleece (1941)
  • Spinster's Dilemma: Being the Serious Story of Virginia Weldon's Quiet Life in New York (1951)

Storms, Roger (1939 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Roger C. Storms was born in Houlton, Maine. He graduated from North Yarmouth Academy and received his BA in 1961 from Eastern Baptist College of St. Davids, Pennsylvania. He taught history, government, and English in the public schools of Dexter and Greenville and was Guidance Director and Chairman of the History Department at Lee Academy. A local historian, he received his MA degree in History in 1968 from the University of Maine at Orono. He was an American Studies Fellow with the Coe Foundation in the summer of 1963, studying American communal societies. In the summer of 1965, he was an NDEA Fellow at Dartmouth College, studying American Toryism during the Revolutionary War. He wrote articles which appeared in such publications as The History Teacher magazine, Maine Historical Society Newsletter, the Bangor Daily News and The National Statesman.

Selected Bibliography

  • History of Parkman; Mainstream Democracy in Parkman, Maine, 1794-1969 (1969)
  • A History of Three Corners (1971)
  • Partisan Prophets: A History of the Prohibition Party, 1854-1972 (1972)

Stott, Jim (1955 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

James Stott was born and raised in Methuen, Massachusetts and graduated from Gordon College in Wenham, MA. After graduating, Jim owned a residential construction firm in the seacoast area of New Hampshire. While earning extra money as a waiter at the renowned Blue Strawbery Restaurant in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, he met and collaborated with Jonathan to create Stonewall Kitchen in 1991 and currently serves as Vice President of the company. He can most often be found mingling with the guests in the Company Store or behind the lens of the camera in the photo studio. (From the Stonewall Kitchens Website).

Selected Bibliography

  • The Stonewall Kitchen cookbook: Faborite Pantry Recipes with Jonathan King (2001)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Harvest: Celebrating the Bounty of the Seasons with Jonathan King and Kathy Gunst (2004)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Favorites: Delicious Recipes to Share with Family and Friends Every Day with Jonathan King and Kathy Gunst (2006)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Winter Celebrations: Special Recipes for Family and Friends with Jonathan King and Kathy Gunst (2009)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Breakfaxt: A Collection of Great Morning Meals with Jonathan King and Kathy Gunst (2009)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Grilling: Fired-Up Recipes for cooking Outdoors All Year Long with Jonathan King and Kathy Gunst (2010)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Appetizers: Finger Foods and Small Plates with Jonathan King and Kathy Gunst (2010)

Selected Resources

King, Jonathan (1965 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Jonathan King was born in Massachusetts, graduated from Londonderry High School in New Hampshire and summered with his five siblings on Cape Neddick, Maine throughout his childhood. He graduated from the University of New Hampshire and holds a BA in Psychology and a minor in Sociology and Fine Arts. After graduating college he pursued a career in hotel management and was resident manager of a historical Connecticut inn. Eventually settling on the coast of Maine, he discovered a deep passion for cultivation. Working in greenhouses during the day and restaurants at night fostered his combined talents for horticulture and cuisine, laying the foundation of what would become Stonewall Kitchen in 1991. He serves as President and Creative Director of the company. (From the Stonewall Kitchens website).

Selected Bibliography

  • The Stonewall Kitchen cookbook: Faborite Pantry Recipes with Jim Stott (2001)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Harvest: Celebrating the Bounty of the Seasons with Jim Stott and Kathy Gunst (2004)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Favorites: Delicious Recipes to Share with Family and Friends Every Day with Jim Stott and Kathy Gunst (2006)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Winter Celebrations: Special Recipes for Family and Friends with Jim Stott and Kathy Gunst (2009)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Breakfast: A Collection of Great Morning Meals with Jim Stott and Kathy Gunst (2009)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Grilling: Fired-Up Recipes for cooking Outdoors All Year Long with Jim Stott and Kathy Gunst (2010)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Appetizers: Finger Foods and Small Plates with Jim Stott and Kathy Gunst (2010)

Selected Resources

Gunst, Kathy (1957 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Kathy Gunst left college to study at the Cordon Bleu in London for six months. Back in New York City, she catered, cooked in restaurants and then worked as a food writer. Before moving to Maine from New York City, Gunst was a culinary editor at Food & Wine Magazine. In the early 1980s, she got an assignment on the best restaurants along the Northeast coasts. She fell in love with Maine, in particular the far southern coast, near Berwick. By 1982, she and her husband had sublet their New York City apartment and moved to Maine for a year - they're still here. Kathy Gunst is the writer of more than 13 cookbooks, including six collaborations with the founders of the specialty food line Stonewall Kitchen. She has received numerous nominations for International Association of Culinary Professionals Cookbook Awards. Gunst is also the Resident Chef for WBUR?s award-winning radio show ?Here and Now,? the midday news magazine show broadcasted over 60 public radio stations nationwide. She has received two James Beard nominations for her work with the show.

Selected Bibliography

  • Stonewall Kitchen Harvest: Celebrating the Bounty of the Seasons with Jonathan King and Jim Stott (2004)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Favorites: Delicious Recipes to Share with Family and Friends Every Day with Jonathan King and Jim Stott (2006)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Winter Celebrations: Special Recipes for Family and Friends with Jonathan King and Jim Stott (2009)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Breakfaxt: A Collection of Great Morning Meals with Jonathan King and Jim Stott (2009)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Grilling: Fired-Up Recipes for cooking Outdoors All Year Long with Jonathan King and Jim Stott (2010)
  • Stonewall Kitchen Appetizers: Finger Foods and Small Plates with Jonathan King and Jim Stott(2010)

Selected Resources

Stover, Arthur (1947 - 2009)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Arthur Douglas Stover was a diligent compiler and researcher with a lifelong interest in history. He was the seasonal docent at the historic Pownalborough Courthouse in Dresden. He lived in Alna, ME.

Bibliography

  • Eminent Mainers : brief biographies of some 540 Mainers mostly dead and a few people from away who have done something useful within the State of Maine (1997)
  • Eminent Mainers : succinct biographies of thousands of amazing Mainers mostly dead and a few people from away who have done something useful within the state of Maine (2006)

Strong, Paul (1957 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Paul I. V. Strong was born and raised in Maine. He earned his B.S. in Biology from the University of Maine, his M.S. in Wildlife Management from Oklahoma State University and his Ph.D. in Wildlife Resources from the University of Maine. He is a Forest Supervisor for the U.S. Forest Service in Wisconsin.

Select Bibliography

  • Habitat Selection by Common Loons (1985)
  • Call of the Loon (1995)
  • Beavers: Where Waters Run (1997)
  • Wild Moose Country (1998)

Stuber, Stanley (1903 - 1985)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Stanley Irving Stuber was born in Gardiner, ME and received his bachelor's degree from Bates College. He entered Rochester Theological Seminary in 1926 and received his B.D. in 1928 and his Master of Theology in 1929. Stanley Irving Stuber earned an international reputation as an advocate of peace, human rights, and goodwill. He was an official observer at various sessions of the United Nations, edited the daily bulletin of the World Council of Churches in Amsterdam, attended the four sessions of the Second Vatican Council between 1962 and 1965, served as executive secretary for the World Relief Committee during World War II, was actively involved in the formation of the National Council of Churches in 1950, chaired the Commission on Religious Liberty of the Baptist World Alliance for 15 years, and served as the executive director for Association Press of the YMCA from 1964 to 1969.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Living Water: An Interpretation of the Religion of Jesus in Modern Terms (1928)
  • How We Got Our Denominations: A Primer on Church History (1948)
  • Public Relations Manual for Churches (1951)
  • Primer on Roman Catholicism for Protestants: An Appraisal of the Basic Differences Between the Roman Catholic Church and Protestantism (1953)

Stucki, Margaret (1928 - 2018)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Margaret E. Stucki was born and raised in New Jersey. She earned her Bachelor in Philosophy from Barnard College (1949), her Master of Arts in Fine Art from Columbia University (1959), an ABD from New York University (1961), and a Doctor of Philosophy from Freedom University, Orlando, Florida (1975). She was a Professor of Art at Hartwick College, New York, 1962-1972.

She was an American painter, writer and photographer, a recipient of several awards for photography, 1951, 1961, 1997, 1999, Poetry prize, Swiss Civic Cultural Society, 1983; grantee, Research Council, Finger Lakes, New York, 1967.

She lived in Farmington, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Primer for Painters: A Base Coat for the Intellect of the Artist (1963)
  • The Revolutionary Mission of Modern Art; Or, Crud and other Essays on Art (1973)
  • War on Light: The Destruction of the Image of God in Man Through Modern Art (1975)
  • Eco-Elegia, or, Elegies in Ecology (1981)

Selected Resources

Sturtevant, Arnold (1929 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

After his retirement from Livermore Falls Trust Co., Arnold and Leda Sturtevant began visiting schools and museums dressed in costume from the Civil War period presenting the story of his great-grandparents, Josiah and Helen. Sturtevant is also a past president of the Washburn-Norlands Foundation. Together they are caretakers of their 18th century family farm located in Fayette, ME and co-authors of histories of Sturtevant family ancestors.

Selected Bibliography

  • Josiah Volunteered: A Collection of Diaries, Letters and Photographs of Josiah H. Sturtevant, His Wife, Helen, and His Four Children (1977)
  • Come With Me From Lebanon: A Study of the Song of Solomon (1984)
  • Home-Nest Chronicles: A Collection of Stories About Some Very Different People from the Past Whose Once Divergent Paths Met at Home-Nest Farm, Fayette, Maine (1999) with Leda Whitney Sturtevant
  • Home-Nest Chronicles Book 3: Cradle to Nest (2008) with Leda Whitney Sturtevant
  • Becketts & Hinges: [Sea Tales of Old North Yarmouth, Maine] (2010) (editor)

Donaldson, Gordon ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Dr. Donaldson is professor emeritus of Education at the University of Maine where he taught graduate courses on educational leadership and research. He has been active in statewide efforts in Maine to develop leadership at the school level, and more recently, in advocating for community schools. Prior to joining the University, Dr. Donaldson was principal of Ellsworth High School, a teacher on North Haven, and in Boston and Philadelphia.

Selected Bibliography

  • Working Together in Schools: A Guide for Educators (1996) with David R. Sanderson
  • How Leaders Learn: Cultivating Capacities for School Improvement (2008)
  • From Schoolhouse to Schooling System: Maine Public Education in the 20th Century (2014)

Sullivan, James (1965 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Sullivan grew up in Quincy, MA, graduated from Colby College (1987) and received his MFA from the University of Iowa Writer's Workshop (1992). He is a contributor to magazines such as Bicycling and works as editor of HME News, a home medical publication based in Yarmouth.

Selected Bibliography

  • Over the Moat: Love Among the Ruins of Imperial Vietnam (2004)

Doyon, Stephanie (1971 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Stephanie Doyon was raised in Lisbon and now lives in Topsham. She studied English Literature at Colby College with Jennifer Boylan and Richard Russo. After college, she worked at Writers House literary agency and began her writing career as a ghostwriter for several popular teen series. In 2007, she was awarded the Maine Literary Award for Fiction.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Greatest Man in Cedar Hole (2005)

Sutherland, William ( - )

Genre: Mystery

Sutherland, William

SEE

John Murray Cooper

Cooper, John (1908 - )

Genre: Mystery

William Sutherland was the pseudonym used by John Murray Cooper when writing his murder mysteries.

Selected Bibliography

  • Behind the Headlines (1933)
  • Death Rides the Air Line (1934)
  • The Proverbial Murder Case (1935)

Selected Websites

Swan, Caroline ( - )

Genre:

Caroline Davenport Swan was born and raised in Gardiner, Maine. She was educated in Cambridge MA and taught French and English in Augusta. She wrote articles for the Globe Review which established her reputation as a critic, but concentrated mostly on poetry.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Unfading Light: [Poems] (1911)
  • Poems (1915)

Swann, E. L. ( - )

Genre:

Swann, E. L.

SEE Lasky, Kathryn

Kinney, Wendall (1935 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Author and humorist Wendall Kinney is a fifth-generation Mainer born "Down East" in the town of Danforth, in Washington County. He attended N.H. Fay High School in Dexter, ME, graduated from Aroostook Central Institute in Mars Hill, and has a bachelor's degree from Norwich University in Vermont. He served in the U.S. Army in Japan and Korea and retired from the Portsmouth Naval Yard in Kittery, ME. He has been writing poetry and prose since 1990.

Selected Bibliography

  • Overhome : and other kitchen table tales (2002)
  • The Bull and I (audiobook) (2014)

Egan, Kate (1970 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Kate is an editor-turned-author living in Brunswick, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Kate and Nate Are Running Late (2012)

Magic Shop Series

  • The Vanishing Coin (2014)
  • The Incredible Twisting Arm (2014)
  • The Great Escape (2014)
  • Disappearing Magician (2014)

Worster, Faith (1989 - )

Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy, Young Adult

Faith Worster was born in Greenville, ME and currently resides in Winslow, ME where she works as an Education Technician II. She began writing in earnest when she was thirteen years old and started "Chronicles of Magic" when she was in college.

Selected Bibliography

  • Chronicles of Magic: The Sixth Child (2014?)

Hardacker, Vaughn (1947 - )

Genre: Mystery

Vaughn C. Hardacker is a writer. He has completed five novels and numerous short stories. He is a member of the New England Chapter of the Mystery Writers of America and has published short stories in three anthologies: Mouth Full of Bullets; Best of Year One, My Teacher Is My Hero, and Deadfall, Level Best Books' sixth annual anthology of New England crime and mystery stories.

He is a veteran of the U. S. Marines and served in Vietnam. He holds degrees from Northern Maine Technical College, the University of Maine and Southern New Hampshire University. He lives in Stockholm, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sniper: A Thriller (2014)
  • The Fisherman: A Thriller (2015)
  • Black Orchid: A Thriller (2016)
  • Wendigo: A Thriller (2017)

Swartz, Brian (1954 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Hampden resident Brian Swartz worked as a photographer and editor at the Bangor Daily News.

Selected Bibliography

  • An American Homecoming 1996

Sweet, Ozzie (1918 - 2013)

Genre: Illustrator

Ozzie Sweet was born Oscar Cowan Corbo on Sept. 10, 1918, in Stamford, Conn. His parents divorced when he was a toddler. When his mother, Elsie Cowan, a nurse who was also an avid photographer, married Hardy Sweet, a mechanic, the family moved to New Russia, N.Y., in the Adirondacks. He returned to Stamford, where he finished high school and also worked as an assistant to Mount Rushmore sculptor Gutzon Borglum, who had built a studio in the area.

Young Ozzie, however, also aspired to be an actor, and he moved to California, where he appeared as an extra in several movies, including ?Reap the Wild Wind? (1942), a 19th-century adventure story, directed by DeMille, that starred John Wayne.

Shortly after the United States entered World War II, Mr. Sweet enlisted in the Army, where he became a photographer. He was stationed in San Diego, where he took his first Newsweek cover, a staged photograph of a G.I. in training, peering over a rock with a knife in his teeth.

Mr. Sweet remained in the Army until after the war was over and then went to work for Newsweek. It was the Feller photograph, in June 1947, that changed the path of his career. As the story goes, it was seen by the editor of Sport, who contacted him. When Mr. Sweet protested that he wasn?t a sports photographer, the editor replied that that?s exactly why they wanted him.

Mr. Sweet was nothing if not prolific. Beyond his magazine work, he took photographs for advertisements and packaging (his picture of a collie appeared on boxes of Milk Bone). He shot antique cars, puppies and kittens for calendars. And he provided the photographs for a series of wildlife books for children, including ?City of Birds and Beasts,? focusing on denizens of the Bronx Zoo. (Excerpted from the NYT obituary, 2/23/2013).

Selected Bibliography

  • The Gulls of Smuttynose Island (1977)
  • Moose (1981)
  • The Boys of Spring: Timeless Portraits from the Grapefruit League, 1947-2005 (2005)

Giampietro, Frank ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Frank Giampietro earned an MA at Washington College and an MFA from Vermont College.

Awards for his poetry include a Walter E. Dakin Fellowship from Sewanee Writers' Conference, a Kingsbury Fellowship from Florida State University, a fellowship from the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and a Florida Book Award. His poetry, nonfiction, short-short fiction, and book reviews have appeared in journals including 32 Poems, American Book Review, Barrow Street, Black Warrior, Cimarron Review, Copper Nickel, CutBank, FENCE, Hayden's Ferry, Ninth Letter, Poetry Daily, Poetry International, Ploughshares, Rain Taxi, Subtropics, and Tampa Review.

He was a resident scholar at The Southern Review from 2010 to 2011 and the managing editor of Alice James Books from 2011 to 2012. He served as the interim director of Cleveland State University Poetry Center and visiting assistant professor of English at Cleveland State University and in the North East Ohio Master of Fine Arts program from 2012 until 2014.

Currently he lives in Farmington, Maine where he works as a free-lance editor and host of the weekly podcast, "Don't Tell Show."

Selected Bibliography

  • Begin Anywhere (2008)
  • Spandrel with Denise Bookwalter
  • Book O' Tondos with Megan Marlatt.

Swett, Sophie (1848 - 1912)

Genre: Children's Literature, Young Adult

Sophie Mariam Swett (AKA Sophia Miriam Swett) was born in Brewer, ME. She was educated in public and private schools in Boston, Massachusetts. She served for a time as an associate editor of Wide Awake, the juvenile periodical established by Daniel Lothrop, a Boston-based publisher of children's books. In later life, Swett made her home in Arlington Heights, Massachusetts.

Selected Bibliography

  • Captain Polly (1889)
  • Stories of Maine (1899)
  • Pennyroyal and Mint (1896)

Sylvester, Harrison (1932 - 2008)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Harrison C. Sylvester was born in Eustis, ME and attended school in Stratton, Worcester Academy in Massachusetts and the University of Maine in Orono where he received his BS in mechanical engineering (1955). He had a varied career in several business ventures, including Morrison and Sylvester in Auburn, the Oxford Paper Co. in Rumford and Sylvester Products in Marlboro, Mass. He later returned to Maine and his farming roots. For 22 years he designed and built classic Whitehall boats which are enjoyed by boaters from Alaska to Florida. He was diagnosed with dyslexia while in his early 50's and devoted the rest of his life to learning disabilities. He was president of Learning Disabilities of Maine and worked with both adults and adolescents in Maine and across the country. He lectured nationally and ran support groups for those affected by learning disabilities.

Bibliography

  • Legacy of the Blue Heron (2002)

Tanous, Alex (1926 - 1990)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Alex Tanous was born in Van Buren, ME. Dr. Tanous attended Van Buren High School, completed a classical education at Boston College and collected an impressive array of degrees?M.A. in philosophy from Boston College in 1960; M.A. in Sacred Sciences and Ph.D work at Fordham University; M.S. Ed. Counseling from the University of Maine in 1973; Doctor of Divinity from the College of Metaphysics in Indiana in 1965. Between 1965-1967 Alex taught Theology at Manhattan College and St. Johns University, both located in New York City. In recent years he taught classes on Psychic Phenomena and related topics at the University of Southern Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Beyond Coincidence: One Man's Experiences with Psychic Phenomena (1976)
  • Is Your Child Psychic?: A Guide for Creative Parents and Teachers (1979)

Tapley, Lance ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Lance Tapley is an award-winning freelance investigative and political writer for the Portland Phoenix and contributes to other publications. He wrote a chapter, ?Mass Torture in America: Notes from the Supermax Prisons,? in the book The United States and Torture: Interrogation, Incarceration & Abuse published by New York University Press.

Selected Bibliography

Books

  • Ski Touring in New England: A Complete Cross-Country Ski Book (1973)
  • Ski Touring in New England and New York (1976)

Video

  • Human Rights in Maine's Prisons (2008)

Seguin, Marilyn (1951 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Marilyn Weymouth Seguin holds degrees in English and Communication from the University of Maine and the University of Akron. She was born and educated in Maine and has spent the last thirty-two summers vacationing at camps in the Sebago Lakes Region. She recently retired from full-time teaching in the Writing Program of the English Department at Kent State University in Ohio. She lives in Gray, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Bell Keeper (2009)
  • The Dogs of War (1998)
  • Where Duty Calls (?)
  • The Freedom Stairs (2009)
  • Gilbert VanZandt (2009)
  • No Ordinary Lives (2009)
  • One Eternal Winter (2014)
  • Silver Ribbon Skinny (2014)
  • Song of Courage, Song of Freedom (2014)
  • Hidden History of the Sebago Lakes Region (2015)

Bloxam, Frances (1934 - 2014)

Genre: Children's Literature

Frances Bloxam was born in Tremont, IL and graduated from the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana, then earned her RN from the College of DuPage in Illinois. In 1972, she and her husband bought a home in and began summering in Cundy's Harbor, then retired to Bath in 1989. Bloxam began writing children's books late in life and Maine's Raising Readers program selected one of her titles, Antlers Forever!, to be given to every child in the state at their five-year well-child checkup. She died in her home in 2014.

Bibliography

  • Antlers Forever! (2001)
  • Little Tom Turkey (2005)
  • Beau Beaver Goes to Town (2009)

Selected Resources

Taylor, Raymond ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Dr. Raymond G. Taylor is a teacher, and pastor. He has seven university degrees and has received numerous honors. He has taught in public and private secondary schools, in a small college, and as a full professor for 16 years in a major American university. For nine years he was Superintendent of Schools in Maine, which followed an equal number of years in other school administrative roles.

His academic interests are divided between the study of systematic theology and statistics and he holds an earned doctorate in each of these fields.

In 1989 he founded the award-winning OR/Ed Laboratories which he ceded to NC State University on January 1, 2000.

He is now retired and divides his time between Maine and Southern Spain.

Selected Bibliography

  • Innovative Practices in Educational Leadership with Romeo O. Marquis (1984)
  • Power Sown; Power Reaped with Richard H. Card (1985)

Teague, Charles (1873 - 1950)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Charles Collins Teague was born in Caribou, ME, moved to Salina, KS when he was eight where he attended the local public schools, and also attended St. John's Military Academy. When he was 20, he moved to Santa Paula, CA and worked as manager of the Santa Paula Horse and Cattle Company and as superintendent of the Santa Paula Water Company. He was best known for his agricultural accomplishments, specifically in citrus (lemon) and walnut growing and was considered the "highest authority" in the state of California. He was manager of Limoneira, which consisted of the largest lemon and walnut groves in California and was responsible for the "Teague Method", a ventilation method for storing fruit before air conditioning was available.

Bibliography

  • Fifty Years a Rancher: The Recollections of Half a Century Devoted to the Citrus and Walnut Industries of California and to Furthering the Cooperative Movement in Agriculture (1944)

Selected Resources

Tebbetts, Leon (1908 - 1977)

Genre:

Publisher, author, illustrator, filmmaker, and book dealer Leon Harold Tebbetts was born in 1908. He graduated from Deering High School in Portland, Maine and studied briefly at Colby College before becoming a journalist with the Maine Sunday Telegram. In 1935, he self-published his first book,The Amazing Story of Maine, a geologic history of the state. This lead to the founding of his Falmouth Publishing House, which operated for more than twenty years and produced works by such notable authors as Marsden Hartley, Arthur MacDougal Jr., and Erskine Caldwell. Tebbetts did many of the illustrations for the works the press produced. His publishing career was interrupted when he was drafted into World War II. Following his return from the military, Tebbetts began (but did not complete) a feature-length film and opened a book store, which he operated for many years in Hallowell, Maine. He also continued to write and publish works, many of which were published by Valley Publishers.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Amazing Story of Maine (1935)
  • Rough Draft (1996)
  • Story of a Maine Publisher (1997)

Selected Resources

Tefft, Nathan (1868 - 1943)

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, General Fiction, Poetry

Nathan A. Tefft began his journalism career in 1886 at The Commercial (Bangor), then moved to the (Skowhegan) Somerset Register for two years. Then he returned to Bangor and managed the Commercial Union Telephone Co., spent a year or so in New York, then returned to Bangor to work on the Bangor Whig and Courier where he wrote a humor column under the name Jeff Strout. He rose to the position of editor until the paper was bought out by the Bangor Daily News in 1900. He remained as a proof reader and telegraph editor until his retirement in 1940. He wrote poetry and plays and became an accomplished artist.

Selected Bibliography

  • Journeys of a Soul (1916)
  • Daughters of Fate: A Three-Act Play of a Once Great War (1918)
  • Needles from the Whispering Pine: Verse; A Close to Nature Series (1924)

Mayfield, Katherine (1958 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Katherine Mayfield was born in St. Louis, Missouri, and lives in southern Maine. As an actress, she appeared Off-Broadway, in independent films, and on the daytime drama Guiding Light before turning to writing.

Her memoir, The Box of Daughter: Healing the Authentic Self, won awards in the 2012 New England Book Festival and Reader's Favorite Awards, and was nominated as a finalist in the 2013 Maine Literary Awards. Her short story The Last Visit won an Honorable Mention award in the 2011 Warren Adler Short Story Contest.

Selected Bibliography:

  • The Box of Daughter: Healing the Authentic Self (2011)
  • Bullied: Why You Feel Bad Inside and What to Do About It (2013)
  • The Box of Daughter & Other Poems
  • Dysfunctional Families: The Truth Behind the Happy Family Facade (2012)
  • Acting A to Z: The Young Person's Guide to a Stage or Screen Career (1998, 2007)
  • Smart Actors, Foolish Choices: A Self-Help Guide to Coping with the Emotional Stresses of the Business (1996)

Terrell, Carroll (1917 - 2003)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Carroll Franklin Terrell was born in 1917 in Richmond, Maine. After graduating from Bowdoin College, Terrell served in the armed forces from 1941 to 1946, then received an MA from the University of Maine in 1950 and earned a PhD from New York University. He worked as an instructor, then Professor of English, University of Maine at Orono 1948-82, then part-time 1982-88 (Professor Emeritus). He was publisher of Paideuma, a journal dedicated to Ezra Pound scholarship, and Sagetrieb, a journal devoted to poets in the Ezra Pound-William Carlos Williams tradition.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dante and Pound: The Epic of Judgement (1974)
  • Smoke and Fire (1985)
  • Stephen King: Man and Artist (1990)
  • Ideas in Reaction: Byways to the Pound Arcana (1991)
  • Growing Up Kennebec: A Downeast Boyhood (1993)

Terry, D. (1964 - )

Genre: General Fiction

D.S. Terry was born and grew up in a lobstering family on the coast of Maine. She graduated from George Stevens Academy in Blue Hill in 1982 and currently lives in Mount Vernon, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Down the Bay (2005)

Thayer, Mildred (1912 - 2005)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Mildred Thayer was born in Brewer, attended Brewer schools and graduated from Brewer High School and Magna Cum Laude from Washington State Normal School at Machias (now the University of Maine) and held bachelors and masters degrees from the University of Maine at Orono. She taught for three years in a one-room rural school in Hampden; for 19 years in Brewer, the last 11 years in science at Brewer Junior High School; and taught science for 18 years at Garland Street Junior High School in Bangor. Mildred also had articles printed in Downeast Magazine, the Maine Teacher, The Science Teacher (National), The Grade Teacher, Junior Arts and Activities, Steamboat Bill and several educational magazines. Her poems were published in anthologies of National Library of Poetry.

Selected Bibliography

  • Brewer, Orrington, Holden, Eddington: History and Families (1962)
  • Patchwork and Ploughshares: Family Anecdotes from Maine's Past (1994)

Thayer, Robert (1947 - )

Genre: Illustrator, Non-Fiction

A native of Bangor, Robert A. Thayer earned a degree from the University of Maine. For 30 years he taught high school science in Massachusetts, and for more than 20 years he has worked as a naturalist during the summer at Acadia National Park. His photography is published in books, magazines and calendars. He is retired from teaching and lives on Mount Desert Island.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Park Loop Road: A Guide to Acadia National Park's Scenic Byway (1999)
  • Beyond the Park Loop Road: Continuing the Exploration of Acadia National Park (2001)
  • Acadia's Carriage Roads: A Passage into the Heart of the National Park (2002)

Theriault, Jeri ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

A Fulbright recipient (1998?1999) and Pushcart Prize nominee (2006), Jeri Theriault graduated from Colby College in her home town of Waterville, ME; she also has an MS in Education and an MFA (with a concentration in poetry) from Vermont College. Some of her publishing credits are: The Beloit Poetry Journal, Patersom Literary Review, The Atlanta Review, Rattle and The Northern New England Review. Her work has been included in several anthologies including French Connections: A Gathering of Franco-American Poets, Orpheus and Company: Contemporary Poems on Greek Mythology, and The Return of Kral Majales: Prague?s International Literary Renaissance, 1990-2010. She lives in Portland, Maine, where she currently teaches in the English Department at the Waynflete School.

Selected Bibliography

  • Corn Dance: [Poems] (1994)
  • Catholic (2002)

Thomas, Eben ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Young Adult

Ben Thomas, has been director of guidance services at Winthrop High School, a ham radio operator and a Master Maine Guide. He has written extensively on canoeing Maine rivers and has written an adventure novel for young adults. He is a graduate of the University of Maine, with a master's degree in education and he lives in Winthrop, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • No Horns Blowing, A Guide to Canoeing 10 Great Rivers in Maine (1973)
  • Hot Blood and Wet Paddles: An Illustrated Guide to Canoe Racing on 14 Maine and New Hampshire Rivers (1974)
  • The Weekender: A Guide to Family Canoeing, 10 More Great Rivers in Maine (1975)
  • Canoeing Maine #1 and #2 (1979)
  • Pocket Guide to the Maine Outdoors (1985)
  • Code Breaker (2009)
  • Scuba Gold (2010)

Thomes, William (1824 - 1895)

Genre: Non-Fiction

William Henry Thomes was born in Portland, ME and worked on ships on the Californian hide trade before joining the gold rush to San Francisco. In 1851-55, during a visit which also took in Hawaii and China, Thomes worked on the Victorian goldfields in Victoria, Australia as a digger and storekeeper before returning to the US to become a journalist and publisher.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Gold Hunters Adventures: Or, Life in Australia (1864)
  • the Belle of Australia: Or, Who Am I? (1883)- - A Whaleman's Adventures in the Sandwich Islands and California (1890)

Thompson, Courtney ( - )

Genre: Illustrator, Non-Fiction

Photographer, author and publisher Courtney Thompson lives on Mt. Desert Island, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Lighthouses: A Pictorial Guide (1996)
  • Massachusetts Lighthouses: A Pictorial Guide (1998)
  • Lighthouses of Atlantic Canada: New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland & Labrador (2000)
  • Lighthouses of Southern New England: A Pictorial Guide (2002)
  • The Lighthouse at Rockland Breakwater (2002)

Thompson, Deborah ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Deborah Thompson earned a Ph.D. from Columbia University and was a Research Associate Professor of History at UMaine, Orono. She has been associated with the Colby College Museum, the Bangor Historical Society, and the Bangor Historic Preservation Committee.

Selected Bibliography

  • Coptic Textiles in the Brooklyn Museum (1971)
  • Maine Forms of American Architecture (1976)
  • St. John's Episcopal Church, Bangor, Maine, 1835-1985: A Sesquicentennial History (1985)
  • Bangor Historic Resources Inventory (1986)
  • Bangor, Maine 1769-1914: An Architectural History (1988)

Chase, Michael (1970? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Michael J. Chase was born and raised in the Bangor/Brewer area. He worked as a photographer for 16 years then, on the advice of a rescued turtle, he chucked it all and decided to devote his life to spreading kindness. He opened the Kindness Center and now travels the world speaking and presenting the doctrine of kindness.

Selected Bibliography

  • Am I Being Kind? (2011)
  • The Radical Practice of Loving Everyone: A Four-Legged Approach to Enlightenment (2013)

Selected Resources

Thomson, Arline, Arline (1912 - 2010)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Arline K. Thomson was born in Lawrence, MA, graduated from Edward F. Searles High School, Methuen, MA and Massachusetts School of Art (now Massachusetts College of Art). She was awarded with an honorary degree from the Massachusetts College of Art in 1993 and the Vincent A. Hartgen Award from the University of Maine in 2007. She worked for many years as a graphic designer and book designer.

Bibliography

  • Discovering Elizabethan London: Diary and Sketches (1994)

Thomson, William ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

William "Bill" O. Thomson is a native New Englander residing in Kennebunk, Maine. Retired Professor Emeritus from Salem State College, Salem, Massachusetts. He has written 20 books and produced 7 documentaries which have been shown on New England television channels. He has also appeared on the "Legendary Lighthouse" series shown on national PBS and in shows on the Learning Channel and Discovery Channel.

Selected Bibliography

Books

  • York is Maine: Cape Neddick, York Village, Nubble Light (1983)
  • Lighthouse Legends & Hauntings (1998)
  • Life as it Was, 1900-1950: New England Reflections (1999)
  • Nubble Light, "A Captivating Lighthouse" (2000)
  • Solitary Vigils at Boon Island Light (2000)

Videos

  • Maine Ghosts the Dead Still Whisper (1992)

Thurlow, Clinton (1907 - 1968)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Clinton F. Thurlow was born in Lee, ME. He was a teacher at Cony High School where he was head of the social studies department and also assistant principal, and taught at the University of Maine at Portland until he retired in 1961. He was a railroad buff, particularly interested in the history of the narrow gauge railway.

Bibliography

  • The Weeks Mills"Y" of the Two-Footer (1964)
  • The WW & F Two Footer, Hail and Farewell (1964)
  • Over the Rails by Steam: A Railroad Scrapbook (1965)
  • A Two-Footer Trilogy: Three Booklets on Maine Railroads and the Two-Footers

Thwing, Charles (1853 - 1937)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Charles Franklin Thwing was born in New Sharon, ME. He graduated from Harvard in 1876 and Andover Theological Seminary in 1879 was ordained in 1879, and served as Congregationalist pastor of churches in MA (1879-86) and MN (1886-90) before becoming president of Adelbert College and Western Reserve University, inaugurated in 1891. During Thwing's 31-year administration, the schools of Library Science (1904), Applied Social Sciences (1916), Law, Dentistry, Pharmacy (1919), Education, the Graduate School (1892), and the Dept. of Religious Education became part of WRU; over 26 new buildings were erected; and instructors increased from 37 to 415. Thwing received many honorary degrees as well as the Cleveland Chamber of Commerce Medal for Distinguished Public Service (1925). He was a life senator of United Chapters of Phi Beta Kappa (national president 1922-28); and a trustee of Cleveland Clinic Foundation, Hiram House, and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching (1905-21). Thwing resigned in 1921, becoming president emeritus. He published over 400 articles and 50 books. Thwing died in Cleveland.

Selected Bibliography

  • Within College Walls (1893)
  • Carrie F. Butler Thwing: An Appreciation by Friends Together with Extracts from Her "Journal of A Tour in Europe" (1899)
  • College Administration (1900)
  • God in His World (1900)
  • The Youth's Dream of Life (1900)
  • a Liberal Education and a Liberal Faith: A Series of Baccalaureate Addresses (1903)
  • The American College: What It Is and What It May Become (1914)
  • Education According to Some Modern Masters (1916)
  • The College Gateway (1918)
  • The American Colleges and Universities in the Great War, 1914-1919: A History (1920)
  • Human Australasia: Studies of Society and of Education in Australia and New Zealand (1923)
  • The American and the German University : One Hundred Years of History (1928)
  • Friends of Men: Being a Second Series of Guides, Philosophers, and Friends (1933)

Selected Resources

Tibbetts, Elizabeth (1953 - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet and author Elizabeth Tibbetts has won several awards for her captivating word formations, including a 2003 Maine Arts Commission Award in poetry, the Penobscot Poetry Prize, Martin Dibner Fellowship, residencies at Blue Mountain Center, Ragdale, and Escape to Create. Her work has been nominated three times for a Pushcart Prize.

Tibbetts's poems have appeared in many publications, including the American Scholar, the Beloit Poetry Journal, Green Mountains Review, Prairie Schooner, and the Spoon River Poetry Review. Her poems have also appeared in the Art of Maine in Winter, and the Maine Poets. Tibbetts lives in Hope, ME. (Portland Press Herald [Portland, Me] 16 Feb 2005: B4)

Selected Bibliography

  • Perfect Selves (2001)
  • In The Well (2002)

Tibbetts, Pearl ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Author Pearl Ashby Tibbetts was a long-time resident of Behtel ME. She was born and raised on an Aroostook County farm.

Selected Bibliography

  • Land Under Heaven (1937)

Tibbott, Franklin (1885 - 1965)

Genre: General Fiction

Franklin Merrill Tibbott was born in Indiana and lived in Chesterville, ME. He attended school at Germantown Academy, was a graduate of Princeton University (1909) and was a novelist, civil engineer and journalist. He served briefly as an engineer in the first World War, received a patent for a rail joint in 1912, worked as an engineer in Nicaragua, the U.S. Forest Service, Norfolk & Portsmouth Traction Company and the Virginia Railway & Power Company. He died in Chesterville, ME.

Bibliography

  • Simon Hastings (1942)

Tinker, Chauncey (1876 - 1963)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Chauncey Brewster Tinker was born in Auburn, ME, graduated from East Denver High School (1895), received his BA (1899), his MA (1900) and his Ph.D (1902) from Yale where he taught English for many years, was a Boswell scholar, and served as Chancellor of the American Academy of Arts and Letters (1949-1951).

Selected Bibliography

  • Nature's Simple Plan: A Phase of Radical Thought in the Mid-Eighteenth Century (1922)
  • Young Boswell: Chapters on James Boswell, the Biographer, Based Largely on New Material (1922)
  • A New Portrait of James Boswell with Frederick Albert Pottle (1927)
  • The Good Estate of Poetry (1929)
  • Painter and Poet: Studies in the Literary Relations of English Painting: The Charles Eliot Norton Lectures for 1937-38 (1938)
  • The Poetry of Matthew Arnold: A Commentary (1940)
  • Essays in Retrospect: Collected Articles and Addresses (1948)

Titus, Georgia (1862 - 1938)

Genre: Poetry

Poet Georgia B. Titus was born and lived for most of her life in West Garland, ME. She attended Greenville High School.

Bibliography

  • A Rose Jar of Verse (1941)

Selected Resources

Tobie, Charles (1894 - 1982)

Genre: General Fiction

Charles R. Tobie was born in Mechanic Falls, ME and lived in Rangeley, ME.

Bibliography

  • The Embers on the Hearth: A Story of William's Family (1953)

Selected Resources

Todd, John (1821 - 1917)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Born in Durham and raised in Brunswick. As a boy, he went to sea for several years, then worked as a blacksmith, finally entering the barbering trade in Portland, ME.

Bibliography

  • A Sketch of the Life of John M. Todd: (sixty-two years in a barber shop) and Reminiscences of His Customers (1906)

Selected Resources

Vietze, Andrew (1969 - )

Genre: Mystery, Non-Fiction

Author Andrew Vietze was born in Norwood, MA and educated at Clark University with a BA in English and History. He is the former managing editor of Down East and has written for a wide variety of magazines and online publications including Time Out New York, New York Times' LifeWire, Weather.com's Forecast Earth, Crawdaddy, AMC Outdoors, Popmatters, Hooked on the Outdoors, Explore, Offshore, Big Sky Journal, MaineBiz, and Maine Times. His book Boon Island was a #1 Amazon Bestseller (US History), winner of a Gold at the 2013 Independent Publisher Book Awards in New York and a 2012 Indie Fab Awards Book of the Year finalist. It was featured on the Travel Channel at the end of June 2014. His previous book Becoming Teddy Roosevelt: How a Maine Guide Inspired America's 26th President won a silver medal at the IPPYs - the Independent Publisher Book Awards was honored by the Maine State Legislature, and was a 2010 Indie Fab Award Book of the Year Award finalist in the biography category. It also spent weeks on the Maine Sunday Telegram's bestseller list.

Selected Bibliography

  • Where in Maine?: A Tour of Intriguing Places in the Pine Tree State (2009)(photos by Kevin Shields)
  • Becoming Teddy Roosevelt: How a Maine Guide Inspired America's 26th President (2010)
  • Boon Island: A True Story of Mutiny, Shipwreck, and Cannibalism (with Stephen Erickson) (2012)

Roth, Henry (1906 - 1995)

Genre: General Fiction

Born in what was then Austria-Hungary (now part of Ukraine), Henry Roth grew up in the Lower East Side and Harlem in New York City. He attended the College of the City of New York (now City College of the City University of New York), receiving a B.S. in 1928. He wrote part of his classic novel Call it Sleep (1934) while living in Norridgewock in 1932. He then lived in Maine from 1946 until 1968, working (among other things) as a duck farmer in Montville and then as a psychiatric aide at the state mental hospital in Augusta.

He was a contributor to several periodicals, including Atlantic Monthly, Commentary, Midstream, New Yorker, Signatures: Work in Lavender, and Studies in American Jewish Literature.

Though critically acclaimed, his novel Call it Sleep only sold 4000 copies in its first publication (1934) but was rediscovered in 1964 and sold over a million copies, rejuvenating Roth's literary career. Roth moved to New Mexico where he died in 1995.

Roth's manuscripts are housed at Boston University and the New York Public Library.

Selected Bibliography

  • Call it Sleep (1934)
  • Nature's First Green (memoir) (1979)
  • Shifting Landscape (1991)
  • Mercy of a Rude Stream (1994)

Berger, Thomas (1924 - 2014)

Genre: General Fiction, Horror, Mystery, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Short Stories

Thomas Louis Berger was born in Cincinnati, OH, graduated from Lockland High School in Cincinnati in 1942, enrolled at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio for a time, then enlisted in the Army, serving in the Medical Corps in England and Germany during WWII.

After the war, he enrolled at the University of Cincinnati, earned his baccalaureate degree (1948, with honors) and pursued graduate work in English at Columbia University.

After Columbia, he held jobs as a librarian at the Tamiment Institute and Library (formerly the Rand School for Social Science) in New York and as a summary writer for The New York Times Index.

He lived in Somesville, ME for several years and some of his novels were written here.

Probably his most-recognized work is Little Big ManNeighbors was also made into a film starring John Belushi and Dan Ackroyd.

Previously uncollected short stories have appeared in magazines such as American Review, Gentleman's Quarterly, Saturday Evening Post, Playboy, and Harper's.

Selected Bibliography

  • Crazy in Berlin (1958)
  • Reinhart in Love (1962)
  • Killing Time (1967)
  • Vital Parts (1970)
  • Regiment of Women (1973)
  • Sneaky People (1975)
  • Who Is Teddy Villanova? (1977)
  • Arthur Rex: A Legendary Novel (1978)
  • Neighbors (1980)
  • Reinhart?s Women (1981)
  • The Feud (1984)
  • Being Invisible (1987)
  • The Houseguest (1988)
  • Changing the Past (1989)
  • Orrie?s Story(1990)
  • Meeting Evil (1992)
  • Robert Crews (1994)
  • Suspects (1996)
  • The Return of Little Big Man (1999)
  • Best Friends (2003)
  • Adventures of the Artificial Woman (2004)

Hildebrandt, Leonore ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Leonore Hildebrandt has published poems in the Cafe Review, the Cimarron Review, Denver Quarterly, Drunken Boat, the Spoon River Poetry Review, and the Quercus Review, among other journals. Her translations of Rilke’s Elegies have appeared in Cerise Press. Her letterpress chapbook The Work at Hand (Flat Bay Press) and a full-length collection The Next Unknown (Pecan Grove Press) are available at flatbaycollective.org. Winner of the 2013 Gemini Poetry Contest, Leonore received fellowships from the Elizabeth George Foundation, the Maine Community Foundation, and the Maine Arts Commission. Her poem Rock Me was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. A native of Germany, Leonore lives off the grid on Flat Bay in Washington County and teaches writing at the University of Maine. She is a member of the Flatbay Collective and serves as an editor for the Beloit Poetry Journal.

Selected Resources

O'Leary III, Timothy (1947 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Timothy O'Leary is a retired Lieutenant Colonel in the U.S. Army, a veteran of Vietnam and the First Gulf Wars. He received his BA in Sociology and French, M.Ed. and his Ed.S. in School Administration and Supervision from Georgia Southern University and his Doctor of Education Degree from the University of Virginia. He was a secondary education teacher and administrator, now retired. He resides in Gorham, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Nowhere to Run (2011)
  • The Portal (2012)
  • The Entity (2013)
  • The Entity's Child (2013)
  • The Entity's Chosen (2012)
  • Tim O'Hara: His Athletic Life and Times (2017)
  • The Dimensional Gateway (2018)

Lee, Paula ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Paula Lee is a cultural historian, a Faculty Fellow at the Center for Animals and Public Policy at Tufts University, and backwoods cook. She has a doctorate in architectural history from the University of Chicago, focusing on the architecture of animal captivity (zoos, slaughterhouses, farms). She splits her time between West Paris, Maine, and Wellesley, Massachusetts.

Selected Bibliography

  • Game: A Global History
  • Deer Hunting in Paris: A Memoir of God, Guns and Game Meat (2013) (Gold, Travel Book, Lowell Thomas Awards, Society of American Travel Writers 2014)
  • The Hunter's Haunch: What You Don?t Know About Deer and Venison That Will Change the Way You Cook (2014)

Bond, Mike (1943(?) - )

Genre: General Fiction

A Portland native, Mike Bond is a best-selling novelist. He was a correspondent for The Financial Times newsletters in Paris from 1990 to 1998, and has reported for many newspapers including The Dallas Morning News, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Denver Post, and The Oregonian. He was also the co-anchor of the PBS news program European Journal in 1987. His novels are known for their thrilling plots, stunning characters, fast pace, and their ability to place the reader deeply in foreign, dangerous and exciting locales. Bond is also an environmental and human rights activist, international journalist and renewable energy expert. Several of his novels take place partially or entirely in Maine. His family came to Maine in the early 1700s; he is a graduate of Deering High and now lives in Winthrop.

Selected Bibliography

  • Saving Paradise (2012)
  • Holy War (2014)
  • House of Jaguar (2014)
  • The Last Savanna (2014)
  • Tibetan Cross (2014)

Graves, Cynthia (1944 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry, Romance Novel

Born in Maine, Cynthia Graves was an educator for twenty-seven years, teaching English, Drama and Speech in high schools. She has always been devoted to writing. Her nonfiction, prose and poetry have earned first prizes in writing competitions and have been published in journals and magazines including Sacred Journey, Edge Life and Living With Loss.

Selected Bibliography

  • Never Count Crow: Love and Loss in Kennebunk, Maine (2007)
  • Dusk on Route 1 (2019)

Trafton, Barbara (1949 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Barbara Trafton was born in Rumford, Maine. She was graduated from Wellesley College with the class of 1971, then attended the University of Southern Maine and earned an M.Ed., and later went to Northeastern for an M.B.A. She has served in the Maine state House and state Senate for two terms and has been a member of the several committees in both houses. She served as the Maine Democratic National Committeewoman, was spokesperson for Maine Turnpike widening in 1991, and is on the Board of the Maine Audubon Society, chairman of the Legislative Policy Committee, the Board of Trustees of the Maine Maritime Academy, and the Review Committee for the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP). She served on the Board of the Mitchell Institute for several years. She has been deeply involved in Maine politics for decades, hosting many candidate events and serving as one of four campaign co-chairs in George Mitchell?s 1982 U.S. Senate campaign.

Selected Bibliography

  • Women Winning: How to Run for Office (1984)

Selected Resources

Trafton, Mark (1810 - 1901)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Mark Trafton was born and raised in Bangor, Maine. He studied at Kent's Hill Seminary, and was ordained pastor of the Methodist Episcopal church in Westfield, Massachusetts. Trafton was elected as the Massachusetts candidate of the American Party (aka the Know-Nothing Party) to the Thirty-fourth Congress (March 4, 1855 ? March 3, 1857) where he was an active leader in anti-slavery reform. After his one term in Congress, he returned to the clergy.

Selected Bibliography

  • Scenes in My Life: Occurring During a Ministry of Nearly Half a Centruy in the Methodist Episcopal Church (1878)
  • The Birch Canoe: A Forest Idyl (1892)

Trott, Rosemary (1909 - 1992)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Poet and author Rosemary Clifford Trott was the founder of Maine Poetry Day and Week and a lifetime honorary member of the National Poetry Day Committee, Inc. She contributed to the Lewiston Evening Journal as well as other newspapers. She was also a teacher of poetry and creative writing and a lecturer. She won several prizes for her writing including first prize for non-fiction from the National League of the American Pen Women in 1976.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sea Mist and Balsam, and other Poems (1958)
  • From One Bright Spark: Maine Singers and their Songs (1959)

Trowbridge, Clinton (1928(?) - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Educator and author Clinton Trowbridge attended Groton School, graduated from Princeton and earned his PhD in English Literature at the University of Florida. He taught English at Rollins College in Orlando, FL, College of Charleston in Charleston, SC, spent 18 years teaching at Dowling College in Dowling, NY, and at College of the Atlantic. He has written several books and his essays and articles have appeared in The Christian Science Monitor, Harper's, The Readers Digest, The Maine Times, and many other newspapers and magazines.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Crow Island Journal (1970)
  • The Man Who Walked Around the World (1979)
  • The Boat that Wouldn't Sink (2000)
  • Grotties Don't Kiss: A Prep School Memoir (2002)

Trowbridge, John (1827 - 1916)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories, Young Adult

John Townsend Trowbridge was born and raised in New York and moved to Boston in 1848 where he wrote for journals and magazines. His major residence was in Arlington, MA but he owned a house and spent a great deal of time in Kennebunkport, ME at Spouting Rock Cottage, the home he built. He also wrote under the pseudonym of Paul Creyton.

Selected Bibliography

Written as John Townsend Trowbridge

  • Vagabonds and other Poems (1869)
  • The Kelp-Gatherers: A Story of the Maine Coast (1890)
  • My Own Story: With Recollections of Noted Persons (1903)
  • The Poetical Works of John Townsend Trowbridge (1903)

Written as Paul Creyton

  • The Midshipman's Revenge (1849)
  • Kate and the Accomplice (1849)
  • The Deserted Family (1853)
  • Burr Cliff: Its Sunshine and its Clouds (1853)

Trueworthy, Nance (1950(?) - )

Genre: Illustrator

Nance Trueworthy is a self-taught professional photographer who lives in South Portland, ME. Her work has been published in books, magazines, greeting cards and calendars.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine in Four Seasons (1988)
  • Down the Shore: The Faces of Maine's Coastal Fisheries (2003)
  • A Seat on the Shore: Quietly Admiring the Maine Coast (2005)
  • Maine Impressions (2007)
  • Maine's Casco Bay Islands: A Guide (2007)
  • Maine Coast Impressions (2008)

Tufts, Henry (1748 - 1831)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Commonly believed to have written the first known criminal autobiography (with the help of a ghost writer), Henry Tufts spent most of his life in and out of prisons and jails ranging from Maine to Virginia. He was a career burglar and bigamist, escaped hanging and from several different prisons and jails. Since most autobiographies of the time were written by upstanding and prominent persons, Tufts' autobiography provides us with a rare glimpse into the life of one from the opposite end of the spectrum.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Autobiography of a Criminal (1930)
  • Living Among the Maine & Acadian Indians (2004)

Selected Resources

Tuck, Fred (1867 - 1953)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Considered to be Maine's first, full-time antiques dealer, Fred Bishop Tuck's diary was found in a second-hand shop by editor Dean A. Fales, Jr. and published as a memoir. It includes stories and anecdotes from Tuck's career from it's inception until the 1920's, mostly in Kennebunk/Kennebunkport, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Antiqueman's Diary: The Memoirs of Fred Bishop Tuck (ed. by Dean A. Fales, Jr.) (2001)

Selected Resources

Tukey, Earl (1907 - 1990)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Game warden Earl A. Tukey was born in Danville Junction, ME (now Auburn), grew up in Belgrade where he attended grammar school, then attended high school in Belgrade, Unity and Clinton where he rode the Belfast-Moosehead Railroad and Maine Central Railroad to get to school. He received his commission in the Maine Warden Service in 1938, then did a two year stint in the Army as an MP. Discharged in 1945, he returned to the Warden Service from which he retired in 1963. In 1990, he published a memoir of his life in the as a game warden.

Bibliography

  • Twenty Five Years as a State of Maine Game Warden (1989)

Selected Resources

  • Article in the Bangor Daily News, Thursday, February 15, 1990, page 11.

Tupper, Stanley (1921 - 2006)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Stanley R. Tupper was a native of Boothbay Harbor, graduated from Hebron Academy, attended Middlebury College in Vermont, served in the navy from 1944-46 and earned his law degree from LaSalle Extension University in Chicago. He served in the Maine Legislature from 1953-54, as Assistant Attorney General and State Commissioner of Sea and Shore Fisheries. then was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives for three terms. He was also appointed U.S. Commissioner General with the rank of Ambassador to the Canadian World Exhibition in 1967 and served on the International Commission for Northeast Atlantic Fisheries in 1975-76.

Selected Bibliography

  • Canada and the United States -- The Second Hundred Years with Douglas L. Bailey (1967)
  • Report of the Commission to Study Ethics in State Government with Kenneth M. Curtis and Eugene Mawhinney (1988)

Selected Resources

Turcotte, Patricia ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Patricia Turcotte and her husband owned and operated Wormwood Farm in Lisbon, ME at one time the largest herb farm in Maine. She ran a thriving business of growing and selling herbs which grew into books and educational presentations.

Selected Bibliography

  • The New England Herb Gardener: Yankee Wisdom for North American Herb Growers (1990)
  • Perennials for the Backyard Gardener (1993)
  • Medicinal Herbs: A Complete Guide for North American Herb Gardeners (2006)

Turner, Clair (1890 - 1974)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Clair E. Turner was born and raised in Harmony, ME and attended school there. After graduation from Maine Central Institute in 1907, he received his A.B. from Bates College (1912) and his MA from Harvard (1913). He worked as a professor at MIT for many years, then was in charge of the teaching of public health at Tufts Dental College. He researched and studied in the area of public health and published many articles and books on the subject.

Selected Bibliography

  • In Training for Health with Jeanie M. Pinckney (1929)
  • Cleanliness and Health with Georgie B. Collins (1932)
  • the Voyage of Growing Up with Grace T. Hallock (1935)
  • Health with Georgie B. Collins (1937)
  • Principles of Health Education (1939)
  • Working for Community Health with Grace Voris Curl (1941)
  • Community Health Educator's Compendium of Knowledge (1951)
  • Personal and Community Health (1952)
  • School Health and Health Education: With Special Considerations of the Teacher's Part in the School Health Program (1952)

Tweedie, Gladys (1905 - 1977)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Author and teacher Gladys Sylvester Tweedie was born in Mars Hill and graduated from Aroostook Central Institute. She also studied at the A.S.T.C. and the University of Maine.

She was the acting postmaster during World War II, in Westfield, Maine as well as a teacher there.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mars Hill: Typical Aroostook Town (1952)
  • the Story of Welthy Ann (1953)
  • Blue Chip (1954)

Selected Resources

Twitchell, Albert (1840 - 1901)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Albert Sobieski Twitchell was born in Bethel, ME where he attended the common school and Gould Academy. He fought for the Union in the Civil War then set up his practice as an attorney in Gorham.

Selected Bibliography

  • Re-Union Poems (n.d.)
  • History of the Seventh Maine Light Battery, volunteers in the Great Rebellion...also, Personal Sketches of a Large Number of Members, Portraits, Illustrations and Poems (1892)

Upton, Joe ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Joe Upton was a commercial fisherman for 25 years in Alaska and Maine. He lives on Bainbridge Island, Washington, and Vinalhaven Island, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Amaretto (1986)
  • Alaska Blues (2008)
  • The Alaska Cruise Handbook (2012)

Upton, John (1897 - 1978)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Originally from Massachusetts, John Upton moved to Bremen in 1947. He was a self-taught craftsman, artist and woodcarver. He served in the U.S. Navy as a mine layer in WWI, then in construction doing finishing work. After his move to Maine, he began making custom furniture, then turned to carving eagles. His eagle "Salem" was presented by Maine Governor Edmund Muskie to President Dwight D. Eisenhower when he visited Maine in 1955. It is now housed in the Eisenhower Library in Abilene, KS. In 1992, a group of his carvings and records which document his works was presented by his daughter to the Maine State Museum.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Art of Wood Carving (1958)
  • A Woodcarver's Primer (1973)

Selected Resources

Vallee, Hubert (1901 - 1986)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Singer, radio personality, actor and author Hubert Prior (Rudy) Vallee was born in Island Pond, VT and grew up in Westbrook, ME. He attended the University of Maine and Yale, then went on to form his own band. He became a very popular singer, radio personality and actor.

Bibliography

  • Vagabond Dreams Come True (1930)
  • My Time is Your Time: The Story of Rudy Vallee with Gil McKean (1962)
  • Let the Chips Fall (1975)

Selected Resources

Van Cleve, Thomas (1888 - 1976)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Thomas Curtis Van Cleve was born in Malden, Missouri and received his A.B (1911) and his A.M. (1912) from the University of Missouri and a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin. He taught history and political science at Bowdoin College from 1915 until his retirement in 1954 when he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Letters degree. He served in WWI and WWII as an intelligence officer.

Selected Bibliography

  • Markward of Anweiler and the Sicilian Regency (1937)
  • The Emperor Frederick II of Hohenstaufen: Immutator Mundi (1972)
  • Observations and Experiences of a Military Intelligence Officer in Two World Wars (2005)

Selected Resources

Vannah, Kate (1855 - 1933)

Genre: Poetry

Kate Vannah was born in Gardiner, ME and attended Gardiner public schools, then St. Joseph's Academy in Emmitsburg, MD. After graduation, she began writing for the press, then composing music and writing and publishing poetry.

Selected Bibliography

  • From Heart to Heart (1893)

Van Savage, Elsie (L C) (1938 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Elsie Van Savage was born on Staten Island, NY and now lives in Brunswick, ME. She has been a columnist for the Brunswick Times Record, an online column in Pencil Stubs Online, hosted a local TV show on MPBN called IncredibleMAINE, a weekly radio show called "Senior Moment" from Bowdoin College and has collaborately written several biographies and a semi-autobiographical novel.

Selected Bibliography

  • LC's Take: Poetry I (1998)
  • To Norma Jeane with Love, Jimmie with Jim Dougherty (2001)

Selected Resources

Van Waes, Robert (1923 - 2010)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Robert Van Waes was born in Kewanee, IL and was a veteran of WWII where he served in the Navy as a signalman on the U.S.S. New Mexico. He received his BA from Tufts University and his MA from Columbia University. He taught American History and Political Science at Monmouth College in New Jersey, then for the American Association of University Professors in Washington, D.C. then retired to Bridgton, ME where he continued to teach at Maine Senior College in Brunswick. He authored verious publications including a weekly humor column for the Lincoln County News.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Folks and Maine Ways (2004)

Varney, Luther (1917 - 2001)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Luther Varney was born and raised in Hampden, Maine. He was a woodsman for nearly eighty years and kept a self-illustrated journal of his experiences. He donated the journal to the Hampden Historical Society for publication as a fund raiser.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Memories (1998)

Selected Resources

Vaughan, Benjamin (1751 - 1835)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Benjamin Vaughan was born in Jamaica, West Indies. His family emigrated to England where he attended Newcome School in Hackney near London, Lincoln's Inn, a college of law, then a school in Liverpool where he was tutored by Joseph Priestly (the discoverer of oxygen) and later in Edinburgh where he studied medicine and graduated in 1781. He was a life-long friend of Benjamin Franklin and was involved in negotiations for peace between England and the United States in 1782 during the American Revolution. He lived in France and in Switzerland, then finally settled on his mother's family's property along the Kennebec River in Maine, eventually called Hallowell. At the time, his personal library was larger that that of Harvard University. He practiced medicine as well as building houses, mills, stores, a distillery, a brewery and a printing office in Hallowell. He published political articles and wrote a historical paper concerning the Northeast Boundary of the U.S. at the request of President John Adams.

Selected Bibliography

  • Letters on the subject of the concert of Princes, and the dismemberment of Poland and France... (1793)

Selected Resources

Verrier, Suzanne ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Suzanne Verrier is a gardener specializing in roses and lives in Phippsburg, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Rosa Rugosa (1991)
  • Titus Tidewater (2005)

Fallon, Dianne (1962 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Dianne Fallon is a writer, teacher, and traveler who lives in Kittery Point, Maine. She has written for newspapers, magazines, and professional journals, and is a former Waterman Fund Alpine Essay contest winner for her essay, "Hunting the Woolly Adelgid."

Selected Bibliography

  • Pioneer on a Mountain Bike: Eight Days through Early American History (2014)

Vetromile, Eugene (1819 - 1881)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Fr. Euguene Vetromile was born in Gallipolis, Italy and was a philologist and missionary taught by the Society of Jesuits. He was ordained as a Jesuit priest in Georgetown, District of Columbia in 1848 and came to Bangor and Old Town to work as a missionary and scholar with the Penobscot tribe in Bangor and Old Town, ME. He worked for 25 years on a dictionary of the Abnaki language.

Selected Bibliography

  • Indian Good Book, made By Eugene Vetromile for the Banefit of the Penobscot, Passamaquoddy, St. John's, Micmac, and other Tribes of the Abnaki Indians (1856)
  • Of Vetromiles' Noble Bible: Such as Happened Great Truths (1860)
  • The Abnakis and Their History (1866)

Selected Resources

Viano, Velia (Val) (1918 - 2009)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Velia (Val) Viano was born and raised in Madison, ME, graduated from Madison High School, then attended Bryant and Stratton Business School in Boston. She lived most of her life in Belmont, Massachusetts.

Bibliography

  • I Laughed and I Cried (2003)

Voisine, Connie ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet Connie Voisine grew up in Maine and earned a BA in American studies from Yale University (1987). She lived in New York City, studying writing at the New School and the Writers Studio, before earning her MFA from the University of California, Irvine, and PhD from the University of Utah. Her first collection, Cathedral of the North (2001), won the Association of Writers & Writing Programs Award Series in Poetry, and her second, Rare High Meadow of Which I Might Dream (2008), was a Los Angeles Times Book Award finalist. (excerpted from www.poetryfoundation.org).

Voisine lives in Las Cruces, New Mexico, where she is an associate professor of English at New Mexico State University and a director of La Sociedad para las Artes.

Selected Bibliography

  • Cathedral of the North (2001)

Volk, Douglas (1949 - )

Genre: Mystery, Science Fiction/Fantasy

Douglas Volk is the CEO of Volk Packaging Corporation in Biddeford, ME.

Selected Bibliography

The Morpheus Series

  • The Morpheus Conspiracy (2014)
  • The Surgeon's Curse (2014)

Vose, Clement (1923 - 1985)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Clement E. Vose was born in Caribou, ME, graduated from the University of Maine, Orono, and earned his Ph.D. at the University of Wisconsin. He served as a combat infantryman in WWII and was wounded at the Battle of the Bulge. His research centered around the study of the human social sources of legal change. He joined the faculty at Wesleyan University in 1958 and became a full professor in 1961. In 1965 he was named the John E. Andrus Professor of Government.

Selected Bibliography

  • Municipal Charters in Maine: The Case of Brunswick (1958)
  • Caucasians Only: The Supreme Court, the NAACP, and the Restrictive Covenant Cases (1959)
  • The Executive Council of Maine in Decline (1959)

Abbott, Moreton ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Moreton G. Abbott was a pianist and teacher who was born in Vermont, but lived for most of his life in Rumford, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Beginner's Luck: A Child's Own First Piano Book (1933)
  • Stepping Stones: A Child's Own Second Piano Book (1936)

Adams, Amy (1904 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Amy Belle Adams was born in Patten, ME, attended town schools and graduated from Patten Academy in 1992. After graduation, she taught for a year in a rural school near home then attended the University of Maine, graduating in 1927. She then taught history and English at Mattanawcook Academy in Lincoln, ME, then earned her MA in English from the University of Maine in 1931. She taught English and American History at Woodland High School in Woodland, ME. Her poetry appeared in Maine-Spring, Portland Press Herald and Sun-Up, as well as Maine and Vermont Poets.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Novels of William Hurrell Mallock (1934)

Adams, William (1871 - 1943)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Author and researcher Rev. William Cushman Adams lived in Searsport, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Jonathan Edwards Adams, D.D., and Maine Congregationalism (1933)
  • Benjamin Cushing of Camden, Maine and Some of His Descendants (1938)

Allen, Ruth (1910 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Ruth DeBertram Allen was born in Lawrence, MA, graduated from Boston University college of Liberal arts with a BA (1931) and taught school at Seekonk MA Junior High School, Sanford ME High School, and taught History of Religion, philosophy and psychology at Nasson College in Springvale, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Meet God (1949)

Anderson, Frank (1895 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Frank Whitehouse Anderson was born in North Woodstock, NH but moved to Maine as a child. He attended grade school in Ellsworth, ME and graduated from Higgins Classical Institute. He served in the Army in WWI, then attended Colby College for a year and Boston University summer school. He worked as a school teacher, woods clerk, policeman and as a U.S. Postal Service mail carrier for 25 years, interrupted by service in the Marine Corps during WWII.

Selected Bibliography

  • Windfalls: A Book of Verse
  • Bushed (1954)
  • Lifting Lines (1986)

Anthony, Alfred (1860 - 1939)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Alfred Williams Anthony was a native of Providence, RI, graduated from Brown University (1883), Cobb Divinity School (1885) and then received his A.M. degree from Brown in 1886. He was a professor at Cobb Divinity School, then at Bates College from 1908-1911. He published several books and pamphlets and served on the boards of trustees from several colleges, including Bates College.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Venture in Good Will; An American and Some English Cathedrals. Entente Cordiale (1931)
  • Bates College and its Background; A Review of Origins and Causes (1936)

Selected Resources

Arey, Leslie (1891 - 1988)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Leslie Brainerd Arey was born and raised in Camden, ME, attended Colby College, received his Ph.D. in Zoology from Harvard University in 1917 and taught at Northwestern University Medical School in Chicago for 73 years beginning in 1916.

Selected Bibliography

  • Developmental Anatomy: A Textbook and Laboratory Manual of Embryology (1940)

Arnold, Walter (1894 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Walter Lewellan Arnold was a Maine native, born in Willimantic, ME. He worked as a professional trapper and guide and manufacturer of animal scents and bait. He also wrote for magazines such as Hunter-Trader-Trapper and Fur-Fish-Game.

Selected Bibliography

  • Professional Trapping (1935)
  • Arnold's Professional Fox Trapping (1977)

Ashby, George (1871 - )

Genre: Poetry

George F. Ashby was born in Fort Fairfield, ME, attended Fort Fairfield schools and worked there as a farmer and selectman. He served as a member of the Maine House in 1929, 1931 and 1933 and a member of the Maine Senate in 1935.

Bibliography

  • Verse from the Kingdom of Pine (1939)

Auger, Alas (1876 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Alas Ellis Auger was born in South Ely, Quebec and moved to Massachusetts when he was a child. He was a druggist in Boston for a time, traveled throughout the South as a lumber purchase agent for the U.S. Shipping Board during WWI, then lived for 30 years in Florida. He moved to Old Orchard Beach in 1932.

Bibliography

  • The Sagamore of Old Orchard (1943)

Averill, Lawrence (1891 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Doctor and author Lawrence A. Averill was born in Alna, ME and lived in Wiscasset.

Selected Bibliography

  • Psychology for Normal Schools (1921)
  • Elements of Educational Psychology (1924)
  • Educational Hygiene (1926)
  • The Hygiene of Instruction: A Study of the Mental Health of the School Child (1928)
  • The Father of His Country (1931) with Esther C. Averill
  • Adolescence: A Study in the Teen Years (1936)
  • Mental Hygiene for the Classroom Teacher (1939)
  • Introductory Psychology (1943)
  • The Psychology of the Elementary-School Child (1949)
  • Psychology Applied to Nursing (1951) with Florence C. Kempf
  • Pie for Breakfast (1953) with Marion Averill

Averill, Naomi (1905 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Naomi Averill (AKA Mrs. J. Edward Elliot) was born in Thomaston, ME, studied art at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY and lived in Thomaston, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Story about Choochee, an Alaskan Eskimo Boy (1937)
  • Whistling-Two-Teeth and the Forty-Nine Buffalos (1939)

Bagley, Marion (1913 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Marion Bagley was born and raised in Trescott, ME, attended the one-room school there. She graduated from Lubec High School, then attended Mount Saint Vincent College in Halifax, Nova Scotia, received her B.S. from Washington State Teacher's College in Machias, ME and did graduate work at the University of Maine. She began teaching at the age of 19 in Trescott and went on to teach in Lubec and Machias.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine History Can Be Fun : An Activity Text (1956)
  • Maine History Can Be Fun : Teachers Guide (1956)
  • Maine History (1964)

Baker, Harry ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Harry T. Baker was born and raised in Rockland, ME, attended Rockland schools and graduated from Rockland High School. He attended Wesleyan University and studied at Harvard specializing in English Literature. He wrote a number of short stories and verses for magazines.

Selected Bibliography

  • The contemporary short story : a practical manual (1916)

Baker, Richard (1948 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Richard E. Baker was born in Marlboro, MA and summered on Peaks Island as a child. He graduated from Columbia University in 1970 and moved to Gorham thereafter.

Selected Bibliography

  • Field Guide to Birds and Wildflowers of Casco Bay and Peaks Island (1976)

Banis, Josephine (1904 - 1974)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Liverpudlian native Josephine Taft Banis lived in Bremen, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • From Bagpipes to Foghorns: An Orphan's Adventures Between Two Worlds (1953)

Barrington, Robert (1910 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Robert Barrington was the pen name for H. Leroy Caston. He was born in Pittston, ME and attended Gardiner High School, then Rollins College in Winter Park, FL and later Wesleyan University. He was an actor, taught in Livermore Falls, ME, wrote short stories, plays and one novel. He lived in Portland, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Some Valiant Ones (1937)

Barrows, John (1865 - 1943)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Newspaper man and author John Stuart Barrows was born and raised in Fryeburg, ME, graduated from Fryeburg Academy 1884), and studied at Bowdoin College and Lowell School of Design (Boston). He worked for the *Oxford County Record in Fryeburg where he learned printing, then as editor for several different newspapers. He published articles on military, naval and general topics for newspapers and periodicals.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Son of "Old Ironsides"; The Story of a Boy on the United States Frigate Constitution During the War of 1812, When She was "a Whole Navy" (1931)
  • Fryeburg: An Historical Sketch (1938)

Barry, William (1846 - 1932)

Genre: Non-Fiction

William Edward Barry was a native of Kennebunk, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Stroll by a Familiar River: Comprising the Colloquy of Saunterers by its Lower Course, and Household Words Pertaining to its Early History (1911)
  • The Blockhouse and Stockade Fort: A Monograph (1915)
  • Chronicles of Kennebunk; Being Scenes and Episodes in an Old Maine Village & Vicinity (1924)
  • Tale of the Three Hills of Agamenticus (1932)
  • A Stroll Thro' the Past: Accompanied by an Invisible Associate, and Using an 18th Century Stage Route... (1933)
  • William E. Barry's Sketch of an Old River (1993)
  • Pen Sketches of Old Houses (2002)

Bartlett, Mary (1857 - )

Genre: Poetry

Mary Russell Bartlett was born in Bangor, ME and was a member of the first graduating class of Wellesley College. She worked for many years as a cataloguer at Boston Public Library.

Selected Bibliography

  • April Song and Wellesley Memories (1929)

Freeman, John (1855 - 1932)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

John R. Freeman was born and raised in West Bridgton, ME. He attended public school in Portland, ME and Lawrence, MA and graduated from the civil engineering department of MIT with a BS in Science. He worked in several public engineering positions throughout New England, including the Massachusetts Mutual Fire Insurance Company. He was interested in the problems of building construction and safeguarding losses due to fire and earthquake both as an engineer and as an insurance executive. He wrote extensively on fire protection matters and a book on earthquake damage.

Selected Bibliography

  • Earthquake Damage and Earthquake Insurance: Studies of a Rational Basis for Earthquake Insurance, Also Studies of Engineering Data for Earthquake-resisting Construction (1932)

Coffin, Peggy (1921 - 1973)

Genre: Poetry

Daughter of Robert P. Tristram Coffin.

Selected Bibliography

  • Two Against Time: Poems (1950) with Vernon Ingraham
  • In My Father's House (197?)

Selected Websites

Foster, Benjamin (1831 - 1903)

Genre:

Benjamin Browne Foster was self-taught, reading at the age of three. He graduated with honors from Bowdoin College and moved to Washington, DC to work in the Post and War Offices. He returned to Maine to study law and was admitted to the Bar in 1858. He wrote for newspapers throughout his life, often using several pseudonyms. He served in the 11th Maine Volunteers during the Civil War and after, settled in Norfolk, VA where he practiced law, then in New York City where he practiced privately as well as the United States Attorney for the district.

Selected Bibliography

  • Down East Diary (1975) with Charles H. Foster

Freeman, Jessie ( - )

Genre: Poetry

New Hampshire native, poet Jessie Wheeler Freeman lived in Gardiner, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Town Down East (1949)

Selected Websites

French, Marion (1920 - 1992)

Genre: Children's Literature

Marion Flood French was born and raised in Brewer, ME and graduated from Brewer High School. She graduated from Bangor Theological Seminary (1944) and worked as Director of Religious Education there for a short time. She moved to the South for a few years, then returned to Bangor and worked for the Bangor Daily News as a proofreader.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mr. Bear Goes to Boston (1955)
  • Gingham Joys (1962)

Hughes, Lew-Ellyn (1957 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Lew-Ellyn Hughes is a columnist and author. Her Maine ancestry dates back to pre-Revolutionary War. The family line started in Orient & Weston in Southern Aroostook County, then for the lumbering industry, migrated to Greenville. Both of her parents and one set of grandparents were born and raised in Greenville, but her father made the military his career. That's why she was born in California in 1957. By 1962 her parents brought the family back every summer to their "camp" on Moosehead Lake. They moved back permanently in 1975, around the time her father retired. She has lived in the state ever since. She writes short stories about the people, places and lifestyle of Maine. Those stories have won the Maine press association's Better Newspaper Contest eight times.

Selected Bibliography

  • A View from the Corner (2006)
  • Diamonds from the Corner (2013)
  • Maine Stories (2016)

Frost, Jack (1915 - )

Genre: Illustrator

Born in Eastport, ME, pen and ink sketch artist and author Jack Frost graduated from Eastport's Shead Memorial High School (1933), attended the University of Maine, then moved to Boston to joint the staff of the Boston Herald. Later, he worked as a columnist and artist for the Boston Post. He started drawing at an early age, but also studied art at Grand Central Summer School at Eastport and at Columbia University.

Selected Bibliography

  • Fancy This: A New England Sketch Book (1938)
  • A Cape Cod Sketch Book (1939)
  • Harvard and Cambridge: A Sketch Book (1940)
  • Jack Frost Calendar (1941)
  • Eternal London: A Sketch Book (1941)
  • Boston--America's Home Port: A Sketch Book (1955)
  • Yankee Homecoming: Official Sketch Book (1958)

Frost, John (1917 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Dr. Frost Is the librarian of the University Heights Library of New York University. A native of Maine, he holds degrees from the Universities of Maine and New Hampshire, Berkeley Divinity School, Columbia and New York Universities.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Kittery, Maine Record Book (1978)
  • Vital Records of York, Maine with Lester Mackenzie (1992)

Fuller, Leah (1897 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Leah Ramsdell Fuller was born In Lubec, Maine (Washington County), July 27, 1897. She was educated at Washington State Normal School and the University of Maine. She has taught in New England secondary schools. She moved to Rockland, Maine, in 1935. She has traveled extensively, spending the summers of 1930 and 1936 in Europe and Africa. At the request of the late W. 0. Fuller, she wrote a column entitled "Abroad in 1936" for his Maine newspaper, the Courier-Gazette. She has a book column "Between the Book Ends" in the Lubec Herald. She lived in Rockland, Maine, and Miami (Coral Gables), Florida.

Selected Bibliography

  • Florimel Fluff: A Cat's Journey into Wonderland (1942)
  • Way, Way Down East (1945)
  • A Little Child Shall Lead Them (1950)

Gammon, Roland (1915 - 1981)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Roland Gammon was born in Caribou, Maine and graduated from Colby College. He served on the editorial staff of several national magazines, including Life, See, and Pageant. His religious articles appeared in Redbook, Good Housekeeping, Parade, The Christian Leader, and Faith Today. During World War II, as a member of an Air Force personnel narratives team, he helped cover combat operations of the 20th Air Force in India, China, and the Mariana Islands.

Selected Bibliography

  • Truth Is One: The Story of the World's Great Living Religions in Pictures and Text with Henry James Forman (1954)
  • Nirvana Now (1980)

Gardner, James (1873 - )

Genre: General Fiction

James P. Gardner was born in Stockwell, England of Scottish parents and after the death of his mother when he was five years old, he spent his childhood with his grandmother at Gattonside in Southern Scotland. Later he was sent to a boarding school In Kelso. At the age of twelve he came to America to live with his father in New York City after the death of his grandmother. Here he entered the public schools. After graduating from grammar school he started work in a banking firm and continued to work in the banking business for nearly fifty years. He was a summer resident of Bailey Island, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Reminiscences of a Scottish Laddie (1940)
  • Peter Salt (1947)

Gardner, Maurice (1905 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Maurice B. Gardner was born and raised in Portland and attended the West School and Deering High School.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bantan--God-Like Islander (1936)
  • Son of the Wilderness (1939)
  • This Man (1939)
  • Bantan and the Island Goddess: Being the Further Adventures of Bantan of the Island (1942)

Gesner, Elsie (1919 - 2007)

Genre: Children's Literature

Elsie Miller Gesner was born and raised in Guilford, CT, educated in Guilford public schools and graduated from the Providence Bible College of Providence, RI, which is now Gordon College. As a pastor's wife for 40 years, she was active in Baptist Churches in Maine, worked some years in insurance and for a law firm. For over 60 years she was a writer for Christian periodicals, and author of several children's books.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Lumber Camp Kids (1957)
  • In the Stillness of the Storm (1963)

Volk, Derek (1969 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Derek Volk was born in Portland, Maine. He attended Deering High School and graduated from the University of Maine at Orono. He is a Maine businessman, supporter of Autism awareness, volunteer, philanthropist, softball coach, and he can now add book author to the list. He is currently the president and co-owner of Volk Packaging Corporation, a third generation, family owned, corrugated box manufacturer in Biddeford, Maine. Derek actively participates on the Maine Business Leadership Network (BLN), a national organization that focuses on connecting employers with potential employees who have disabilities. His own company currently employs those who are deaf, blind and on the autism spectrum. A speech communications major at the University of Maine at Orono, Derek has always been comfortable speaking to an audience. Since 2012, Derek has hosted a Saturday morning radio talk show on WLOB 1310AM in Portland, Maine. His show can be heard online at www.derekvolkshow.com and through podcasts available on iTunes and Stitcher.

Selected Bibliography

  • Chasing the Rabbit (2015)

Selected Resources

Ross, Barbara (1953 - )

Genre: Mystery

Barbara Ross is a mystery author and co-editor/co-publisher at Level Best Books, which produces an award-winning anthology of crime and mystery stories by New England authors every November. She blogs with a wonderful group of Maine mystery authors at Maine Crime Writers and with a group of writers of New England-based cozy mysteries at Wicked Cozy Authors. In her former life, Barbara was a co-founder and Chief Operating Officer of two successful start-ups in educational technology.

Barbara and her husband own the former Seafarer Inn at the head of the harbor in Boothbay Harbor, Maine. When they aren't in Boothbay, she and her husband live in Somerville, MA.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Death of an Ambitious Woman (2010)

Maine Clambake Mysteries

  • Clammed Up (2013)
  • Boiled Over (2014)
  • Musseled Out (2015)
  • Fogged In (2016)
  • Iced Under (2017)
  • Stowed Away (2018)
  • Steamed Open (2019)
  • Sealed Off (2020)

Erikson, Patricia ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Peaks Island resident Patricia Pierce Erikson is an author, educator and consultant. She works as Director of Marketing and Communications and editor of, Postscripts Alumni Magazine at Thornton Academy in Saco. She received her Ph.D. in Cultural Anthropology, Native American Studies from the University of California-Davis, her M.A. University of California-Davis, and her B.A. in Geology from Smith College. She has published in several journals including Portland Magazine, Columbia: The Magazine of Northwest History, Munjoy Hill Observer, Arctic Journal, Cultural Anthropology, and Museum Anthropology.

Selected Bibliography

  • Voices of a Thousand People: Makah Cultural and Research Center with Helma Ward and Kirk Wacher (2002)

Garniss, George (1886 - 1980)

Genre: Non-Fiction

George Winslow Garniss was born and raised in Worcester, MA and received his bachelor's and master's degrees in physical education from Springfield College. He lived for many years in Yarmouth, ME where he was active and instrumental in the Yarmouth Historical Society, cataloging its collections and creating his own system of indexing. He wrote about the history of Yarmouth.

Selected Bibliography

  • Profiles of Yarmouth heritage : a review of the historical publications of the history of Yarmouth, Maine (1967)
  • Historical beginnings (1970)

Gilley, Wendell (1904 - 1983)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Wendell Holmes Gilley was born and raised in Southwest Harbor, ME. He attended the University of Maine and worked for many years as a plumbing contractor. His second career was as a carver of wooden birds.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bird carving; a guide to a fascinating hobby (1961)

McCullough, David (1933 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Born in Pittsburgh, PA, Pulitzer Prize-winning author and historian David McCullough lives in Boston and Camden, ME. He was educated at Linden Avenue Grade School and Shady Side Academy in Pittsburgh and earned his BA in English at Yale (1955). He worked as an editor and writer for the U.S. Information Agency and as an editor at American Heritage before writing full time.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Johnstown Flood (1968)
  • The Great Bridge (1972)
  • The Path Between the Seas: The Creation of the Panama Canal, 1870-1914 (1977)
  • Mornings on Horseback (1981)
  • Truman (1992) Pulitzer Prize winner
  • John Adams (2001) Pulitzer Prize winner
  • 1776 (2005)
  • In the Dark Streets Shineth: A Christmas Eve Story (2010)
  • The Greater Journey: American in Paris (2011)
  • The Wright Brothers (2015)

Gilman, Drew (1898 - 1963)

Genre: Poetry

Maine writer Drew B. Gilman was a resident of Farmington Falls/Chesterville, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Idylls of Chesterville Hill (1928)
  • The Storm in My Heart (1939)
  • I Throw My Cap on Sidewise: Poems (1950)

Selected Web Resources

Gilman, Stanwood (1903 - 1978)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Stanwood Cushing Gilman was born in Phippsburg, ME, was educated in Bath, graduated from Morse High School (1923) and attended Training School for Teachers of Mechanic Arts in Boston graduating in 1926, then received his BS in education from Boston University and did graduate work at the University of Maine. He taught in Philadelphia and Boston, Walpole and Laconia NH and acted as principal and superintendant of Maine School union 48 until retirement in 1959.

Selected Bibliography

  • Phippsburg on the Kennebec, 1607-1964 (1964) with Margaret C. Gilman
  • Small Point, "The Cape of Many Islands," 1667-1965 (1965) with Margaret C. Gilman
  • Georgetown on Arrowsic: The Ancient Dominions of Maine on the Kennebec 1716-1966: 250 Anniversary Celebration (1966) with Margaret C. Gilman
  • Land of the Kennebec : "Ye Great and Beneficial River," 1604-1965 (1966) with Margaret C. Gilman

Gilmore, Pascal (1845 - 1931)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Pascal Pearl Gilmore of Bucksport, was born in Dedham, ME. Pascal received his education in the schools of Dedham and at the East Maine Conference Seminary, in Bucksport. In 1861 he joined the Army of the Potomac and was in the Peninsular Campaign of 1862. Later he was a recruit to the Sixteenth Regiment, Maine Volunteers, and was present at the surrender of Lee at Appomattox. After the war he resumed his studies at Bucksport, teaching during the Winter. From 1867 to 1871 he worked in Michigan, surveying or "inspecting" lumber and logs, returning to the East due to poor health. From 1873 - 1891 he lived on the family farm in Dedham in business making legal conveyances and in manufacturing. Mr. Gilmore was on the Board of Selectmen in Dedham, nine years as chairman, and fifteen years Supervisor of Schools. He was a Representative to the Legis1ature in 1875 and 1883, also State Senator from Hancock County in 1891. The same year he was appointed State Liquor Commissioner by Governor Burleigh.

Selected Bibliography

  • Civil War Memories; Personal Experiences and Observations of the Author, with Quotations from the Highest Authorities (1928)

Gilpatric, George (1849 - 1944)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

George Alden Gilpatric was born and raised on a farm just outside Kennebunk, ME. He was educated in Kennebunk schools, then spend several years in Newton, MA where he learned the carpentry trade then returned to Kennebunk. He worked for much of his life at the Leatheroid Manufacturing Company of Kennebunk. For many years he collected and recorded items of town history which he compiled and printed.

Selected Bibliography

  • the Village of Kennebunk, Maine. Interesting Facts from Old Documents and Maps, and Observations by the Author (1935)
  • Kennebunk History: not a history of Kennebunk but a few items in addition to and a sequel to "The Village of Kennebunk Maine" (revised to 1939): a description of a few more old homes, a few biographical sketches (1939)

Gleason, Harold (1895 - 1975)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Harold Gleason was born in Dorchester, MA. He graduated from the Boston Latin School, Harvard, and earned his MA at Trinity College. He taught for many years at Kingswood School in West Hartford, CT. His poetry was published in many magazines, newspapers and anthologies.

Selected Bibliography

  • Music in America: An Anthology from the Landing of the Pilgrims to the Close of the Civil War, 1620-1865 (1964)
  • For All Good Fishermen (And Their Wives) (1970)
  • Quest's End (1974)
  • Method of Organ Playing (1996)

Going, Clayton (1914 - 1988)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Clayton G. Going was born in Biddeford, ME, graduated from Dickinson College in Pennsylvania in 1937 and lived in Kennebunk and Berwick for many years before he moved to New York state. He worked on newspapers in Binghamton and Poughkeepsie, was correspondent for the United Press, and editor on the military desk of the Overseas News Division of the Office of War Information.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dogs at War (1944)

Goss, Leroy (1887 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Leroy E. Goss lived as a boy on an island in Penobscot Bay. In later life, he lived in Portland with a summer home in Weld, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Afterglow: A Maine Narrative of Penobscot Bay Islanders (1966)
  • Knight of the Road (1969)
  • The Bayport Boomerang (1973)

Goss, Rachel (1906 - 1954)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Rachel Carter Goss was raised in Richmond, ME and home schooled. She worked as a Girl Scout camp counselor and as a home maker.

Bibliography

  • As the Twig is Bent (1951)

Wadsworth, Charles (1917 - 2002)

Genre: Illustrator

Charles E. Wadsworth was born in Ridgewood, NJ and studied at The American People's School and the Art Student League in New York. He lived with a community of artists on Great Cranberry Isle, ME and is considered to be the first of the late twentieth century Great Cranberry Isle artists.

Selected Bibliography

Illustrator

  • Islands Off Maine (1977) (Leslie Norris, author)
  • Fireweed and other Poems by William H. Matchett
  • Strange Gravity: Songs Physical and Metaphysical by Paul Petrie

Author/Poet/Illustrator

  • Views from the Island: Poetry and Prints (1978)
  • A Tourist in Ludlow and other Poems: Poetry and Watercolors (1984)

Walker, Mark (Malcolm) (1919 - 2007)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Author and playwright Mark Walker was born in New Portland, ME and graduated from the Good Will-Hinckley School in Hinckley, ME. He worked as a tradesman for many years, retiring in 1984 when he began his writing career. Mark authored a novel of suspense fiction, as well as plays produced off-Broadway and in regional theater, and wrote two memoirs. Maine Roots: Growing Up Poor in the Kennebec Valley, an account of his upbringing in rural Maine, was named the best-selling Maine book of 1994 and 1995 by the Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance.

His second memoir, Working for Utopia 1937-1953, published in 2000, was declared an important document by labor historians. It recounts hard times as a young man during the Great Depression, his activism as a socialist and union organizer, and as a merchant seaman in World War II.

Mark also co-authored Dreiser's "'Other Self': The Life of Arthur Henry with his wife Maggie. Published in 2005, this biography of Henry, Maggie's grandfather and close friend and mentor of the famous author, was praised by Dreiser scholars for adding new insight into his life and literary development.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Roots: Growing Up Poor in the Kennebec Valley (1994)
  • Unravelling Genes: A Layperson's Guide to Genetic Engineering (2000) with David McKay
  • Working for Utopia, 1937-1953 (2000)
  • Dreiser's "Other Self": The Life of Arthur Henry (2005) with Maggie Walker

Wallace, Willard (1912? - 2000)

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Historian, educator and author Willard Mosher Wallace was born in South Portland, ME, received his bachelor's and master's degrees from Wesleyan University and his doctorate in history from the University of Pennsylvania. He taught at Lehigh University and at Wesleyan University.

Selected Bibliography

  • Appeal to Arms: A Military History of the American Revolution (1951)
  • Traitorous Hero: The Life and Fortunes of Benedict Arnold (1954)
  • Friend William (1958)
  • Sir Walter Raleigh (1959)
  • Soul of the Lion: A Biography of General Joshua L. Chamberlain (1960)
  • East to Bagaduce (1963)
  • Jonathan Dearborn: A Novel of the War of 1812 (1967)
  • The Raiders: A Novel of the Civil War at Sea (1970)

Walsh, Abigail (1935 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Abigail Walsh is a children's author. She worked as a fourth grade teacher in Machiasport, and her short stories, articles and poems have appeared in several periodicals including Skylark, Mythellany, and the Machias Valley Observer.

Selected Bibliography

  • Momma-Cat (1990)
  • Geraldine, Grandma and the Ghost (2006)

Ward, Ernest (1884 - 1977)

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Ernest E. Ward was born in Norway, ME and moved to Harrison as a young man. He organized and built the Waterford and Brownfield Light and Power Companies (both later sold to CMP) the Harrison Water Co., and was organizer of the Harrison Fire Department, incorporated in 1941. His other activities include being a real estate broker, dedimus justice, and notary public, justice of the peace. A life-long Democrat, was chairman of the Democratic Town Committee from 1923-1959, served 12 terms as Harrison selectman was moderator numerous years and in 1932 served in the Legislature, was also a principal founder and first secretary of the Maine Municipal Officers Association.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Cat's Meow (1966)
  • My First Sixty Years in Harrison, Maine with a few Home-Drawn Sketches by the Author (1966)
  • Diry [ie Diary] of a Juryman (1967)

Selected Resources

Warner, Mark (1936? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Mark Warner is a photographer and author who is known for his photography of wildlife and for boating magazines.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Appalachian Trail: An Aerial View (2004)
  • Monhegan: A Guide to Maine's Fabled Island (2008)
  • The Tragedy of the Royal Tar: Maine's 1936 Circus Steamboat Disaster (2010)

Warren, James (1921 - 2010)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

James Warren was born in Lubec, ME,graduated from Deerfield Academy, Deerfield, MA, and Bowdoin College with a BS in Chemistry. He worked for many years in the canning industry, then as executive secretary for the Maine Sardine Council.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Warren Genealogy-Descendants of James Warren 1622-1702 (1999)
  • Maine Sardine Industry: History 1875-2000 (2000)
  • Maine Sardine Brands (2003)
  • Maine Blueberry Industry History, 1865-2003: an Anthology with Dr. David E. Yarborough (2004)

Selberg, Erik (1988 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Erik grew up in Brunswick Maine. He earned a Bachelor Degree in History at the University of Maine and then served in the United States Navy. He now lives in New Hampshire.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Talisman (2015)
  • Between the Rows of Strawberries (2015)

Washburn, Fred (1889 - 1968)

Genre: Poetry

Poet and carpenter Fred Farrington Washburn was born in Atkinson, ME and lived for many years in Dover Foxcroft. He was a finish carpenter and a poet.

Selected Bibliography

  • Laughter and Tears (1951)

Washburn, Dexter (1861 - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet Dexter Carleton Washburn was born in Rockport, ME and lived in Lewiston, ME where his father was the rector of the Trinity Episcopal Church. He was educated at Nichols' Latin School in Lewiston and graduated from Bates College in 1885. While at Bates, he published poetry in magazines and papers and was one of the editors of the college magazine The Bates Student. He worked at the International Art Publishing Co., later the Lakeside Press, in Auburn, ME, then moved to New York where he worked for the Daily Press and the Daily World. In 1889, he gave up writing and went into business in Boston.

Selected Bibliography

  • Songs from the Seasons (1886)

Washburn, Fremont (1918 - 1998)

Genre:

Fremont "Monty" E. Washburn was born in Peru, ME and attended Dixfield Schools. He served two years in the Navy and worked at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard for 30 years. He wrote articles for Maine Sportsman for nearly 15 years, as well as articles for New Hampshire Outdoorsman, The Maine Paper and American Shotgunner as well as several books.

Selected Bibliography

  • Flinches and Other Strange Birds: The History and Humor of Maine Trapshooting Since 1874 (1971)
  • Way to Hell and Gone: A Collection of Fireside Dreams and Memories (1976)
  • Musings of a Maine-iac (1976)

Webb, Theodore (1918 - 2014)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Born in 1918 in Bangor, Maine, the Rev. Webb graduated from University of Connecticut and Bangor Theological School. Ordained in 1945, he served at churches in Maine, Connecticut, Massachusetts and New York and was executive director of the Unitarian Universalist district in Boston from 1962 to 1970. After retiring, he served as an interim pastor at Unitarian Universalist churches in Baltimore, Iowa City, Minneapolis and Atlanta. He spent 25 years researching and writing a history of the Washburns, an influential Maine family in the 19th century that produced a governor, U.S. senator, congressmen, ambassador to France and founders of the Universalist Church, which merged with the Unitarians in 1961. (Obit. The Sacramento Bee; Oct. 24, 2014)

Selected Bibliography

  • Seven Sons: Millionaires and Vagabonds (1999)
  • Impassioned Brothers: Ministers Resident to France and Paraguay (2002)

Wasson, David (1823 - 1887)

Genre: Non-Fiction

David Atwood Wasson was born in West Brooksville, ME, attended Bowdoin College for one year, then attended Bangor Theological Seminary. He worked as a pastor for a year in Groveland, MA then in Worcester, MA but lost his position due to his abolitionist views. In 1867, he was a founder of the Free Religious Association.

Selected Bibliography

  • Essays, Religious, Social, Political (1889)

Watkins, Paul ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Paul Watkins lives in Jackman, ME during the Summer and in New Jersey the rest of the year where he teaches. Born to Welsh parents in America, Paul Watkins attended boarding school at the Dragon School and Eton College in England. He received his first book deal at age 21, after graduating from Yale. He has written several books -- 10 novels and two books of non-fiction under his own name, as well as the Pekkala suspense novels written under the pseudonym "Sam Eastland."

Selected Bibliography

Paul Watkins Titles

  • The Promise of Light (1993)
  • Archangel (1995)
  • Stand Before Your God: An American Schoolboy in England (1995)
  • Night Over Day Over Night (1997)
  • In the Blue Light of African Dreams (1998)
  • The Story of My Disappearance (1998)
  • Fellowship of Ghosts: A Journey Through the Mountains of Norway (2004)
  • The Ice Soldier (2006)
  • The Forger: A Novel (2014)

Sam Eastland Titles

Inspector Pekkala Series

  • Eye of the Red Tsar: A Novel of Suspense (2011)
  • The Red Coffin (2011)
  • The Red Moth (2013)
  • The Beast in the Red Forest: An Inspector Pekkala Novel of Suspense (2014)
  • Red Icon (2015)

Webb, Robert (1947 - 2013)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Robert Lloyd Webb was a native of California, born in Santa Monica and growing up in Culver City. He attended Culver City schools, the University of Oregon and graduated from California State University, Northridge with a degree in English. He was a librarian and educator at the Kendall Whaling Museum in Sharon, MA and a curator at the Maine Maritime Museum in Bath. He wrote many articles and three books.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sailor-Painter: The Uncommon Life of Charles Robert Patterson (2005)
  • On the Northwest: Commercial Whaling in the Pacific Northwest 1790-1967 (1988)
  • and Ring the Banjar: The Banjo in America From Folklore to Factory (1984)

Webb, Hillary (1971 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Dr. Hillary S. Webb received her undergraduate degree in Journalism from New York University, her MA in Consciousness Studies from Goddard College, and her PhD in Psychology from Saybrook University. She is the former Managing Editor of *Anthropology of Consciousness and former Research Director at the Monroe Institute. She lives in Southern Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Exploring Shamanism: Using Ancient Rites to Discover the Unlimited Healing Powers of Cosmos and Consciousness (2003)
  • Traveling Between the Worlds: Conversations with Contemporary Shamans (2004)

Walshe, Melissa (1984 - )

Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy, Young Adult

Melissa Walshe was born in Waterville, raised in Oakland, educated in Portland, and is currently housed in Lisbon Falls. She is the author of the Sidhe Diaries, the first of which (Autumn's Daughter) was published in 2014.

Melissa holds a B.A. in linguistics from the University of Southern Maine and an Ed.M. in language and literacy from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. She is the founder of ReadMaine.com and is dedicated to building a robust community network to support Maine writers, from school-age kids to retirees.

Selected Bibliography

  • Autumn's Daughter (2014)
  • Autumn's Sister (Coming Fall 2015)

Libby, Michelle (1972 - )

Genre: Romance Novel

Michelle Libby is a Maine native who has lived everywhere from an island off the coast to Aroostook County. She now resides in Windham. She writes romance novels.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dog Days of Summer (2005)
  • Kidnapped (2006)
  • Married to the Marine (2007)

Weil, Zoe ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Zoe received a Master?s in Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School (1988) and a Master?s in English Literature from the University of Pennsylvania (1983). She is also certified in Psychosynthesis counseling. She is the co-founder and president of the Institute for Humane Education (IHE), and is considered a pioneer in the comprehensive humane education movement, which works to create a humane, peaceful, healthy and just world for all people, animals, and the environment through education.

Selected Bibliography

  • Animals in Society: Facts and Perspectives on Our Treatment of Animals (1991)
  • So, You Love Animals: An Action-Packed, Fun-Filled Book to Help Kids Help Animals (1994)
  • Above All, Be Kind: Raising a Humane Child in Challenging Times (2003)
  • The Power and Promise of Humane Education (2004)
  • Most Good, Least Harm: A Simple Principle for a Better World and a Meaningful Life (2009)

Selected Resources

Milliken, Maureen ( - )

Genre: Mystery, Non-Fiction

Maureen Milliken, who grew up in Augusta, is a graduate of the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, MA and is author of the Bernie O'Dea mystery series, which is set in Franklin County, Maine. She's a longtime former journalist who lives in the Augusta area.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Afterlife Survey : A Rabbi, a CEO, a Dog Walker, and Others on the Universal Question - What Comes Next? (2012)
  • Cold Hard News (2015)
  • No News is Bad News (2016)
  • Bad News Travels Fast (2018)

Selected Resources

Weir, Anne (1942 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Born in Boston, Anne Weir received her Bachelors degree from Swarthmore College, Pennsylvania (1964)and her Master of Education from the University Maine, Orono (1984) and is a Certified elementary and secondary education teacher. She lives in Pownal, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Book of Certainties: Elementary Experiences (1993)
  • The Color Book (1996)
  • Marlowe: Being in the Life of the Mind (1996)
  • Plain Talk (1997)

Gould, Deborah ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Deb Gould grew up in Portland and Brunswick, Maine. She attended college in New Hampshire, then moved to Boston and worked in a major publishing firm. Upon her return to Maine, she worked on a dairy farm, then owned a successful graphic arts business. She returned to school and earned a degree in sign language interpreting and spent 25 years in public education specializing in the English language acquisition of students with cochlear implants. She lives in East Pittston, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Household: A Novel (2011)
  • The Eastern (2015)

Weiss, Ann (1943 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Author Ann E. Weiss lived in North Whitefield, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • The American Congress (1977)
  • God and Government: The Separation of Church and State (1982)
  • The Nuclear Arms Race: Can We Survive It? (1983)
  • Biofeedback, Fact or Fad? (1984)
  • Over-the-Counter Drugs (1984)
  • Bioethics: Dilemmas in Modern Medicine (1985)
  • Seers and Scientists: Can the Future be Predicted? (1986)
  • The Supreme Court (1987)
  • Lies, Deception, and Truth (1988)
  • Prisons: A System in Trouble (1988)
  • Who's to Know: Information, the Media and Public Awareness (1990)
  • Lotteries: Who Wins, Who Loses? (1991)
  • Money Games: The Business of Sports (1993)
  • Virtual Reality: A Door to Cyberspace (1996)
  • Easy Credit (2000)
  • Adoptions Today: Questions and Controversies (2001)

Selected Resources

Wells, Theodore (1788 - 1871)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Theodore Wells was born and raised in Wells, ME. He went to sea at the age of 17 but Wells remained his home for most of his life -- he married, raised his family and died there. He wrote one book -- a memoir, published in 1874.

Bibliography

  • Narrative of the Life and Adventures of Capt. Theodore Wells, of Wells, ME, Giving a Minute Account of his voyages and the Places Visited (1874)

Selected Links

Werler, Edward (1913 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Ed and Mary Jane Werler moved to Stacyville, Maine in 1947 to a small cabin along the trail to the summit of Deasey Mountain where they lived for three Summers while Ed worked as the fire watchman in the tower on the mountain. He then worded as a Baxter State Park Ranger at Chimney Pond and later for the Maine State Park System. He lives in Waldoboro, ME where he was awarded the Boston Post Cane in 2013 as the town's oldest citizen at the age of 100.

Bibliography

  • The Call of Katahdin: Life in Werler's Woods (2003)

Morin, Christopher (1973 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Christopher W. Morin was born, raised, and currently resides in Portland, Maine. He received a B.A. in Journalism from the University of Maine at Orono. He is a history enthusiast and has enjoyed creative writing since penning his first short story back in second grade.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Besieged (2014)
  • A Tale of Life and War (2014)
  • The Rebel's Wrath: A Novel (2016)
  • Three Labs A Lifetime : Memoirs Of The Family Dog(S) (2016)
  • Rogue Plunder (2019)

Phillips, Dale (1957 - NA)

Genre: General Fiction, Horror, Mystery, Non-Fiction

Born in Providence, RI, Dale Phillips lived for most of his early life in The County. He received his BA from the University of Maine (Orono) where he took writing seminars from Stephen King. He has lived all over Maine and has traveled widely. He now resides in Massachusetts.

Selected Bibliography:

  • Shadow of the Wendigo (2013)
  • How to Improve Your Interviewing Skills (2014)

The Zack Taylor Mystery Series (Maine setting)

  • A Memory of Grief (2015)
  • A Fall From Grace (2015)
  • A Shadow on the Wall (2015)
  • A Certain Slant of Light (2015)
  • A Sharp Medicine (2017)
  • A Darkened Room (2019)

Story Collections

  • Fables and Fantasies (2013)
  • Strange Tales (2013)
  • Apocalypse Tango (2014)
  • Crooked Paths (2014)
  • Halls of Horror (2014)
  • Jumble Sale (2014)
  • The Big Book of Genre Stories (2014)
  • More Crooked Paths (2015)
  • More Fables and Fantasies (2016)
  • More Crooked Paths (2015)
  • The Last Crooked Paths (2017)

With Other Authors

  • Insanity Tales with Stacey Longo, et al (2014)
  • Insanity Tales II: The Sense of Fear with David Daniel et al (2015)
  • Rogue Wave: Best New England Crime Stories 2015 with Mark Ammons et al (2015)
  • Red Dawn: Best New England Crime Stories 2016 with Mark Ammons (2016)
  • Windward: Best New England Crime Stories 2017

Potter-Clark, Dale (1948 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Dale Marie Potter-Clark is a native Mainer, born in Augusta, who resides in Readfield. She is a charter member of the Readfield Historical Society and has written several historical mongraphs and books related primarily to the history and people of Readfield and Central Maine. She has also published articles in Discover Maine magazine and local newspapers.

Selected Bibliography

  • Rev. Isaac Case: 1761-1852, Readfield, Maine (2013)
  • The Sanborns of East Readfield, Maine: Life in "Frog Valley" and Beyond (2013)
  • To Those who Followed the Lead...Readfield, Kennebec County, Maine: From the Early 20th Century to the Time of our National Bicentennial in 1976
  • Six Oral Histories: Summer 2015 (2015)

West, Austin (1913 - 2011)

Genre: Poetry

Born in Haverhill, MA, Austin West moved to Maine after high school, marrying and settling in Bridgton. He served in the Navy during WWII on destroyer escorts searching for submarines. He worked at many professions during his lifetime, such as chaplain, sailor, fisherman, lumberjack, welder, ship fitter, farmer, florist, teacher, steeplejack, deep-sea diver and a salesman. He became a poet later in life and, during his late seventies, after finding himself widowed and homeless, he used the sales of his books of poetry to support himself and a non-profit organization to assist the homeless.

Selected Bibliography

  • Lyrical Whispers from the Sea (1968)
  • Driftwood from the Sea: [Poems] (1988)
  • I am the Sea: [Poems] (1990)
  • By the Brook: Book Three (?)

Westman, Heinz (1902 - 1986)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Westman was a self-educated pioneer in the theory and practice of psychotherapy, a refugee from the Holocaust who lived and worked in Switzerland, England, and the United States - New York City and Readfield, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Structure of Biblical Myths: The Ontogenesis of the Psyche (1983)
  • The Springs of Creativity ((1986)

Weston, Theodora ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Author Theodora Wright Weston is a resident of Winterport where she is the town historian.

Selected Bibliography

  • Frankfort-Winterport: The Separation Story: Winterport's 125th Anniversary (1985)
  • Winterport Births prior to 1990: Copied from Town Records with Cora McLeod and Naida MacNaughton (1985)
  • Weston Homestead Farm, Madison, Maine with Donald W. Weston and Barbara L. Hennig (1986)
  • Send Me: The Biography of Dr. Harriet Parker Vaughan (1988)

Wetterau, John ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Poet and novelist John Moncure Wetterau was born in Greenwich Village, NYC but raised in Woodstock, NY a small town in the Catskill mountains. He has lived in Portland and Peaks Island, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Every Story is a Love Story (2000)
  • Joe Burke's Last Stand (2000)
  • O & F (2000)
  • The Book with the Yellow Cover: Poems (2003)
  • The Education of Harry George and Charley Walker (2005)
  • Straight Walker (2006)
  • Wild, Hard, Sweet (2007)
  • On the Road to Dharamsala (2008)
  • Michelangelo's Shoulder (2009)
  • Sans Fin: Poems (2011)

Weymouth, Clinton (1902 - 1986)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Scientist, educator and author Clinton G. Weymouth was born in Freeman, ME, graduated from Kingfield High School and Bowdoin College (1924). He lived in Strong, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Guide and Workbook in Biology (1936)

Selected Resources

Wheaton, Dale ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Dale Wheaton is a third generation Maine guide who grew up around East Grand Lake Stream, ME. He still guides fisherman in the area and, in the off season, has taught economics at the University of Maine, Orono. He lives in Holden and Forest City Township, ME.

Bibliography

  • Observations from the Stern (1995)

Wheeler, William (1875 - 1958)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Born and raised in Brunswick, William A. Wheeler made Gorham his home for many years. He was a "railroad man" for 55 years, working for the Maine Central Railroad until his retirement in 1945. After retirement, he operated a printing business and authored several books and newspaper features for the Portland Sunday Telegram and the Brunswick Record.

Selected Bibliography

  • Brunswick Yesterdays: A Boy's Eye View of the Old Town in the Early '80's (1944)
  • The Maine Central Railroad, 1847-1947 (1947)
  • Ma Sez (1956)

Selected Resources

White, Katharine (1892 - 1977)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Katharine Sergeant Angell White was born and raised in the Boston area, graduated from Bryn Mawr and began working as an editor at The New Yorker in August of 1925, six months after it was founded. She was an important editor of fiction and has been described as the person who shaped and guided that magazine. She was married to author E. B. White, and mother to fellow editor Roger Angell.

Selected Bibliography

  • Onward and Upward in the Garden (1979)
  • Two Gardeners: Katharine S. White and Elizabeth Lawrence: A Friendship in Letters (2002) edited by Emily Herring Wilson

Dudar, Peter ( - )

Genre: Horror

Horror author Peter N. Dudar was born in Albany, NY and raised in the neighboring town of Latham. He is an alumnus of Christian Brothers Academy, and received his Bachelor of Arts degree in English at the State University of New York at Albany. He currently resides in Lisbon Falls, Maine and is a member of the New England Horror Writers.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dolly and Other Stories 2013
  • A Requiem for Dead Flies: A Supernatural Ghost Thriller (2013)
  • The Angel of Death (2013)
  • Where Spiders Fear to Spin (2015)

Higgins, Jaynie (1957 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Jaynie F. Higgins, A.C.,C.P.T., is a former Mrs. Maine America. She is a diabetes advocate, mentor, and role model who has lived with Type I diabetes most of her life. Jaynie is a health & wellness consultant, certified activity and recreational coordinator/director, certified sought after fitness trainer, motivational speaker,life coach, and Nautilus award winning author.

Bibliography

  • The Ultimate Diabetes Meal Planner (2009)

Whitehouse, Florence (1869 - 1945)

Genre: General Fiction

Florence Brooks Whitehouse was born in Augusta, ME attended Augusta public schools and St. Catherine's Hall boarding school. After her marriage to Robert Treat Whitehouse, they moved to Portland, ME where they wrote, directed and acted in several plays. She became active in the suffrage movement in 1913 and in 1915 she helped to launch the Maine branch of the National Woman's Party for which she served as chairwoman for 13 years. After women's suffrage was enacted, she turned her attention to working on the Equal Rights Amendment, joined the National Council on Prevention of War, chaired the Government and International Cooperation Committee of the Maine League of Women Voters, served as the state Chairman of Government and International Cooperation for the Maine Federation of Churches and represented the State Peace commission on the World Unity Council, plus had a weekly radio program.

Bibliography

  • The God of Things (1902)
  • The Effendi (1904)

Whiting, Michelle (1951 - 2013)

Genre: Poetry

Michelle Bailey Whiting was born in Bellows Falls, VT and graduated high school in Warner, NH. She also taught sign language in the greater Skowhegan and Fairfield, ME region.

Bibliography

  • As a Woman (2004)

Whitman, Charles (1873 - 1937)

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Charles Huntington Whitman was born in Abbot, ME and attended Bangor High School, received his BA from Colby College (1897) and his PhD from Yale (1900). He was an assistant professor at Lehigh University, then in 1906 jointed Rutgers University. In 1911 he was made the Chair of the Rutgers University English Department where he remained until his death.

Bibliography

Translations

  • The Christ of Cynewulf (1900)

Reference Works

  • A Subject Guide to the Poems of Edmund Spenser (1919)

Whitman, William (1832 - 1901)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Short Stories

William Edward Seaver Whitman was born in South Boston and attended Hawes School and the Lyceum. He was a journalist for the Boston Journal for many years; edited and owned the Daily Times and American Sentinel; was the official reporter for the Maine Legislature for several years. He wrote short stories under several different pen names. He lived in Augusta, ME.

Bibliography

  • The Ship-Carpenter's Family: A Story for the Times (1855)
  • Maine in the War for the Union: A History of the Part Borne by Maine Troops in the Suppression of the American Rebellion (1865)
  • History and Description of the Eastern Branch of the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, near Augusta, ME. A complete Guide for Visitors (1879)
  • Memorial to the Second Maine Regiment of Volunteers in the Civil War [1968]

Whittemore, Edwin (1858 - 1932)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Rev. Edwin Carey Whittemore was born in Dexter, ME, attended Dexter High School and Coburn Classical Institute, graduating in 1875. He graduated from Colby College in 1879 and from Newton Theological Institution in 1882. He was ordained a Baptist minister and was a pastor in several New England Baptist churches including the First Baptist Church of Waterville, ME.

Bibliography

  • History of the First Baptist Church of Nobleboro, Maine, 1793-1893 (1893)
  • Colby College, 1820-1925: An Account of its Beginnings, Progress and Service (1927)
  • The Centennial History of Waterville, Kennebec County, Maine: Including the Oration, the Historical Address... (1988)

Bell, Ted (1946 - 2023)

Genre: General Fiction

Native Floridian Ted Bell graduated from Randolph-Macon College (BA English) in Virginia. He also has an honorary degree in Fire Arts from Kendall College of Art and Design in Grand Rapids, MI. He worked in advertising while writing screenplays for Hollywood, selling his first at age 25. He retired in 2001 to write full time. He splits his time between San Francisco and New Haven, ME.

Selected Bibliography

Alex Hawke Novels

  • Hawke (2003)
  • Tsar (2008)
  • Warlord (2010)
  • Phanton (2012)
  • Warriors (2014)
  • Patriot (2015)
  • Overkill (2018)
  • Dragonfire (2020)

Wiggin, Agnes (1908 - 2004)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Agnes Innes Wiggin was born, raised and lived for most of her life in Buxton, ME. She attended the little red brick school house in Salmon Falls and graduated from Samuel D. Hanson High School in Buxton. During WWII, she was welder at the South Portland Shipyard and later served as a nanny to many families in the greater Portland area. She came to writing books late in life, not publishing until after she was 80. She died in 2004.

Selected Bibliography

  • Home: Salmon Falls, Buxton, Maine (1988)
  • Aunt Etta's Diaries, 1870-1871 (1990)

Wiggin, Ruby (1908 - 1996)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Selected Bibliography

  • Albion on the Narrow Gauge (1964)
  • Big Dreams and Little Wheels (1971)
  • As I Remember (1987)

Wight, Eric ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Author Eric Wight is a former Maine Game Warden who served from 1963 to 1985. He lives in Bethel, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Game Wardens (1985)
  • Life and Death in the North Woods: The Story of the Maine Game Warden Service (2014)

Wilkins, Austin (1908 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Austin Horatio Wilkins was born in Sommerville, MA. He received his BS in Forestry from the University of Maine at Orono in 1926, his masters degree in Forestry from Cornell University and an honorary doctorate in humane letters from the University of Maine, Augusta in 2002. While studying for his masters, he studied forestry in Europe and was at LeBorget Airfield in Paris when Charles Lindburgh landed after his historic flight over the Atlantic Ocean. He was a member of the Maine Forest Service for 44 consecutive years. He lived in Augusta, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Progress Report on Birgh Leaf Minor Problem with H. B. Peirson and R. L. Taylor (1930)
  • the Forests of Maine, Their Extent, Character, Ownership, and Products (1932)
  • Ten Million Acres of Timber: The Remarkable Story of Forest Protection in the Maine Forestry District (1909-1972) (1978)
  • In the Public Interest: the Civilian Conservation Corps in Maine with Jon A. Schlenker, Norman A. Wetherington (1988)

Wilkins, Mesannie (1889 - 1980)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Mesannie Wilkins was born and raised on a pig farm in Minot, ME. In 1954, at the age of 63, alone and ill, she decided to take the money she raised selling homemade pickles and ride her horse, Tarzan, across the country. She completed her 7000 mile odyssey riding all the way to California. Her book Last of the Saddle Tramps: One Woman's Seven Thousand Mile Equestrian Odyssey was written about her journey.

Bibliography

  • Last of the Saddle Tramps: One Woman's Seven Thousand Mile Equestrian Odyssey (1967)

Selected Resources

Wilkoff, William ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

William G. Wilkoff, MD is a Board Certified pediatrician practicing in Brunswick, ME. He attended Harvard Medical School (1971) and served his residency at Duke University, Durham, NC and children's Hospital, Boston, MA. He has written several books on child care.

Selected Bibliography

  • coping with a Picky Eater: A Guide for the Perplexed Parent (1998)
  • Is My child Overtired? The Sleep Solution for Raising Happier, Healthier Children (2000)
  • How to Say No to Your Toddler: Creating a Safe, Rational, and Effective Discipline Program for Your 9-Month-Old to 3-Year-Old (2003)

Willard, Jim ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Jim Willard attended Boston College, the University of Maine at Orono (B.S. History, M.Ed. and C.A.S. in Secondary Counseling). He taught for 26 years, many of those at Leavitt High School as a history teacher. He and his wife Terry hosted a popular PBS television series about genealoty called Ancestors.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ancestors (1997) with Terry Willard and Jane Wilson

Selected Resources

Willard, Terry ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Terry Willard attended the University of Maine at Orono (B.A., M.A., and C.A.S. in French). She taught French at Leavitt High School for many years. Upon retirement, she and her husband Jim hosted a popular PBS television series on genealogy called Ancestors. They live in Florida.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ancestors (1997)

Selected Links

Williams, Anne (1943 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Anne Douglas Williams was born in Montreal, Quebec, Canada and her family lived for a time in Washington, DC. She received her BA from Smith College (1965) and her MA and PhD from the University of Chicago (1972, 1976). She was an Assistant Professor of Economics at the University of Pennsylvania from 1975-1981 and since 1981 has been an Associate Professor of Economics at Bates College in Lewiston, ME. She is a jigsaw puzzle enthusiast who collects and cuts her own puzzles.

Select Bibliography

  • Jigsaw Puzzles: An Illustrated History and Price Guide (1990)
  • The Experience of the Great Depression in Lewiston-Auburn, Maine: A Report by First Year Seminar 187, Bates College, Winter 1996 (1996)
  • The Experience of the Great Depression in Lewiston-Auburn, Maine volume II: A Report by the Economics s37 Class, Bates College, Spring 1998 (1998)
  • The Jigsaw Puzzle: Piecing Together a History (2004)

Selected Resources

  • Americana Magazine; February 1991. p. 52-55
  • Down East Magazine; December 1990. p. 53-56
  • Maine Vertical File Folder Biographies "Wi"

Williams, Loring (1897 - 1970)

Genre: Poetry

Born in South Berwick and educated in Sanford and Kents Hill, Loring E. Williams lived in University Heights, OH for much of his life, returning to South Berwick upon his retirement. He was a poet, educator and publisher, owner of American Weave Press. He was co-founder of the State of Maine Writers' Conference (with Adelbert Jakeman).

Selected Bibliography

  • In Sarah Orne Jewett's Garden (1935)
  • America Singing: A Yearly Book of Verse (1931-1937)
  • Twenty Years Ago: A Reminder as the World Rushes on Toward another Cataclysm (1937)
  • With Careful Eye [1940-1949]
  • Selected Poems (1963)
  • Brother Crow (1967)
  • Fifty Years Ago: [Poems] (1968)

Williams, Phyllis (1931 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Phyllis S. Williams was a nurse, counselor and author. She was a graduate of Bates College and the University of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Nourishing Your Unborn child: Nutrition and Natural Foods in Pregnancy (1974)
  • The Natural Baby Food Cookbook with Margaret Elizabeth Kenda (1982)
  • Science Wizardry for Kids with Margaret Kenda (1992)
  • Geography Wizardry for Kids with Margaret Kenda (1997)

Williamson, Joseph (1828 - 1902)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Joseph Williamson was born in Belfast, ME, was educated in Belfast schools and graduated from Bowdoin College in 1849. He was admitted to the Bar in 1852 and practiced in Belfast. He was a historian and researcher who wrote several books about Maine history as well as numerous articles for magazines and newspapers.

Selected Bibliography

  • History of the City of Belfast in the State of Maine (1877-1913)
  • A Bibliography of the State of Maine (1896)

Williamson, Julia (1859 - 1909)

Genre: Poetry

Poet Julia May Williamson lived in Augusta, ME. She wrote under the nom de guerre of Lura Bell. She published her first book of poetry at the age of 16.

Selected Bibliography

  • Echoes of Time and Tide (1878)
  • The Choir of the Year (1878)
  • Star of Hope and Other Songs (1885?)

Williamson, Samuel (1891 - 1962)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Samuel Thurston Williamson was born in Maine and raised in Massachusetts where he graduated from Haverhill High School, then completed a year at Morristown School in New Jersey, then received his bachelor's degree from Harvard (1916). He was a reporter at the New York Times, covering the Washington, DC bureau after World War I. He served as a member of the editorial staff of the Sunday Times, served as Assistant Sunday Editor of The Times, as a reporter for Newsweek. He also wrote numerous book reviews for the *The Times as well as several books.

Selected Bibliography

  • Trends in Collective Bargaining: A Summary of Recent Experience with Herbert Harris (1945)
  • Imprint of a Publisher: The Story of Frank Gannett and His Independent Newspapers (1948)
  • The Road is Yours: The Story of the Automobile and the Men Behind It with Reginald M. Cleveland (1951)

Willimetz, Emil (1919 - 2003)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Emil Willimetz was a student at Black Mountain College during the 1930's and a documentary filmmaker at Highlander Folk School. He ran an audiovisual company in Knoxville, then a film company in Peru, moving to New York when the company was nationalized. He led nature/adventure tours in the Amazon rainforest, New Guinea and New Zealand. He moved to Maine in 1985 where he died in 2003.

Selected Bibliography

  • Gringo: The Making of a Rebel (2003)

Willis, John (1856 - 1924)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Doctor, historian and author John Lemuel Murray Willis lived in Eliot, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Fogg Family of America (1907)
  • The Physicians of Eliot, Maine (1907)
  • The Submission of Maine to Massachusetts (1909)
  • History of the Centennial of the Incorporation of the Town of Eliot, Maine, August 7th-13, 1910 (1912)

Wilson, Charles (1897 - 1967)

Genre: Poetry

Charles Grenville Wilson was a writer, poet, photographer and artist who lived in Kingfield, ME. He was born in Philadelphia, attended the DeLancey School there, in Westgage-on-Sea, England and at St. Paul's School in Concord,NH and a year at Oxford. He moved to Maine after serving in WW I.

Selected Bibliography

  • Winter in Maine: And Other Poems (1935)
  • Of Men and Mountains: Poems (1940)
  • Hugh McDermott: [Poem] (1942)

Wing, Charles (1939 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

A PhD graduate of MIT, Principle Investigator in NASA's Apollo Lunar Program, and Physics Instructor at Bowdoin College, Charlie Wing co-founded the nation's first two owner-builder schools, developed the first DOE-approved computerized home energy audit, wrote and hosted the national PBS TV series, "Housewarming with Charlie Wing", appeared on over 400 radio and television shows about energy conservation, served as founding and technical editor for "Smart Homeowner Magazine" and has written and illustrated 30 books. He lives on the Coast of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • From the Ground Up (1976) with John N. Cole
  • From the Walls In (1979)
  • Retrofitting: The Thermal Upgrading of Buildings (1979)
  • The Tighter House (1981) with John Lyons and the Staff of Cornerstones
  • House Warming with Charlie Wing (1983)
  • Breaking New Ground (1986) with John N. Cole
  • The Visual Handbook of Building and Remodeling: The Only Guide to Choosing the Right Materials and Systems for Every Part of Your Home (1990)
  • the Liveaboard Report: A Boatdweller's Guide to What Works and What Doesn't (1993)
  • Better Homes and Gardens New complete Guide to Home Repair & Improvement (1997) with Benjamin W. Allen
  • Home Improvement Encyclopedia (2000) with Larry Erickson
  • Boatowner's Illustrated Electrical Handbook (2006)
  • How Boat Things Work: An Illustrated Guide
  • How Your House Works: [A Visual Guide to Understanding & Maintaining Your Home] (2007)
  • Get Your Captain's License (2008) with Jim Austin
  • The Visual Handbook of Building and Remodeling: A Comprehensive Guide to Choosing the Right Materials and Systems for Every Part of Your Home (2009)
  • The Visual Handbook of Energy Conservation: A Comprehensive Guide to Reducing Energy Use at Home (2013)

Selected Resources

Winkin, John (1919 - 2014)

Genre: Non-Fiction

John Winkin was born in Englewood, NJ, attended Dwight Morrow High School there,Duke University where he earned his bachelor's degree in Education (1941)and his master's and doctorate in Education from Columbia University. He served in the Navy during WW II, then returned to NJ where he pursued a career in Journalism as a writer and founding editor of Sport Magazine. He then worked as a broadcaster for the New York Yankees. He is best known as a baseball coach at Colby College and the University of Maine at Orono.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maximizing Baseball Practice (1995) with Jay Kemble and Michael Coutts
  • The Baseball Coaching Bible (2000) with Jerry Kindall
  • Baseball Skills & Drills (2001) with Mark Johnson, Jack Leggett, Pat McMahon

Winslow, Barbara (1947 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Barbara Winslow has lived in Maine for over 35 years and taught school in Skowhegan for 25 of those years. She lives in Norridgewock, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dance on a Sealskin (1995)
  • Fancy and Francis (2012)
  • The Kennebec is Rising (2014)

Wise, Bill (1958 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Bill Wise is an award winning children's book author who resides in Gorham, Maine and teaches at Greely Junior High School in Cumberland, ME. In addition to two published books,he is a frequent contributor to Scholastic Math Magazine. He has also contributed articles to Highlights for Children and Dynamath.

Selected Bibliography

  • Whodunit Math Puzzles (2001)
  • Louis Sockalexis: Native American Baseball Pioneer (2007)

Broadbent, Perigine (1975 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Illustrator, Short Stories

Peri Broadbent is a self-published author and illustrator from Maine. She grew up in South Windham and Bridgton, and has lived all over the state. She has been drawing and worrying since she was very little, completing her first children's book at age 12, "Chester the Cow Goes On A Diet". Her drawing style is colorful and bold, leaning more toward whimsy and fantasy than realism. Peri now resides in North Berwick, ME, with her girlfriend and her three children, and is working on a series of stories about the Land of Lo.

Bibliography

Illustrator

  • Heddy the Lighthouse by Susan Bassler-Pickford (2003)
  • Snuggie Bear Goes to the Maine Wildlife Park by Cynthia Grimm (?)

Self-publisher, writer and illustrator

  • Acorns, Bees, and Cheddar Cheese - a Rhyming Book of ABC

Morin, Amy (1979 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Amy Morin was raised in Dexter, Maine and she currently resides in Enfield.

Selected Bibliography

  • 13 Things Mentally Strong People Don't Do (2014)

Frangoulis, George (1943? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

A few years after George Frangoulis graduated from the University of Michigan (1965), he moved to Blue Hill, ME to become a "back to the land" organic farmer. While there, he began the Farmstead Press (1973) and later relocated both farmstead and press to Freedom, ME and Sugar Bush Farm. He became publisher and editor of Farmstead Magazine, among others, which flourished for many years. In 1988, desiring to pursue other interests, Frangoulis sold the publishing business and relocated to Alabama where he began teaching at the University of Alabama's College of Communication and chaired its Magazine Publishing Program. He has also served as adjunct professor of journalism at Judson College in Marion, AL and the University of Montevallo. The Farmstead Press has been re-launched and now publishes several organic farming-related journals.

Publications of Farmstead Press (1973-1988)

  • Farmstead Magazine
  • American Gardener Magazine
  • Animal Husbandry Journal

Publications of the Farmstead Press re-launch

  • Campus Green
  • Farmstead Tech
  • Organic Buzz Magazine
  • Treks & Journeys

Selected Resources

Wellman, Donald (1944 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

A descendants of the first colonialist to live on Big Cranberry Island, Donald Wellman spent Summers and Winters as a school boy on the island and attended Pemetic High School in Southwest Harbor. He was an early member of Maine Writers and Publishers Alliance and for a time hosted his press O.ARS on the island.

Selected Bibliography

Author

  • Roman Exercises (2015)
  • Remando de noche: La Poesía de Donald Wellman // Night Rowing: The Poetry of Donald Wellman, [a bilingual selected poems]. tr. Francisca Gonzalez-Arias; ed. Nicolás Estévez. (2015)
  • The Cranberry Island Series
  • A North Atlantic Wall (2010)
  • Prolog Pages (2009)
  • Fields (1995)

Translator

-The Espresso Between Sleep and Wakefulness [El expresso entre el sueño y la vigilia] translated with the author, Roberto Echavarren (2016) - Neila's Evening Song: Last Poems of Yvan Goll (2015) - Description of the Lie, a translation of Descripción de la mentira by Antonio Gamoneda (2014) - Enclosed Garden: A Translation of Jardín cerrado by Emilio Prados (2013) - Gravestones [A translation of Antonio Gamoneda’s Lápidas] (2009)

Morgan, Genevieve ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Young Adult

Genevieve (G.A.) Morgan is a writer and editor living in Portland. Maine. She was born in Manhattan and attended the Spence School and graduated with a BA in English from Bowdoin College. After moving to California, began working as a copy editor at SF Magazine then became the managing editor at Chronicle Books in San Francisco. After five years, she left to co-found a book-packaging company that produced a variety of work, including Saints: A Visual Almanac of the Virtuous, Pure, Praiseworthy and Good and its follow-up: The Devil. She has written books for Smith & Hawken, Williams-Sonoma, Starbuck?s, The Nature Company, Harper Collins, Borders Books, and Hay House publishers, and was the wellness editor for Maine magazine. Her work on health topics has appeared in The Bangor Daily News, as well as Body and Soul and Insight magazines.

She lives with her husband and two teenagers in Portland, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Core Balance Diet: 28 Days to Boost Your Metabolism and Lose Weight for Good (2009) with Marcelle Pick
  • Undecided: Navigating Life and Learning after High School (2014)

The Five Stones Trilogy

  • The Fog of Forgetting (2014)
  • Chantarelle (2015)
  • The Kinfolk (2016)

Selected Resources

Holm, Chris ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery, Science Fiction/Fantasy

Chris Holm was born in Syracuse, New York and lives in Portland, ME. His short fiction has appeared in such publications as Ellery Queen?s Mystery Magazine, Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, and THE BEST AMERICAN MYSTERY STORIES 2011. His books have garnered more than fifty Year?s Best nods. He?s been longlisted for a Stoker Award and nominated for a number of awards, including three Anthonys, two Derringers, two Spinetinglers, a Barry, a Lefty, and a Macavity.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dead Harvest (2012)
  • The Wrong Goodbye (2012)
  • The Big Reap (2013)
  • The Killing Kind (2015)
  • Red Right Hand (2016)

Selected Resources

Rodrigue, Barry (1949 - )

Genre:

Barry H. Rodrigue was born and raised on the eastern borderlands of Canada and the United States. He worked in Alaska for 20 years as an ethnographer, field biologist, journalist and commercial fisherman. While there, he founded the international journal, Archipelago, and collected songs, stories and music for the legendary Folkways Records (available through the Smithsonian Institution's Global Sound series). A Fulbright Scholar and graduate of The Evergreen State College (Washington) and L'Universit? Laval (Qu?bec), Dr. Rodrigue works as a geographer and archeologist on projects pertaining to ethnicity and global networks ? both as a scholar and as an active world citizen. His efforts focus on the local, regional and global linkages between issues as diverse as indigenous adaptation in the Appalachian Highlands and peace initiatives in the Caucasus. He has produced a variety of award-winning articles and books, individually and with others, such as L?Histoire r?gionale de Beauce-Etchemin-Amiante (2003), which was runner-up for the Canadian Historical Association's Sir John A. MacDonald Prize for most significant contribution to Canadian history. He is presently a professor at the University of Southern Maine (USA), where he founded The Collaborative for Global & Big History (for more information, visit their website at http://www.usm.maine.edu/bighistory). He also serves as International Coordinator of the International Big History Association (IBHA). Barry lives on the Coast of Maine with his wife Penelope, son Kenai, grandson Dimitri, and their two dogs ? Yukon and Sakura. He spends his free time hiking in the forest, and enjoys music, reading, and writing fiction. (From Rodrigue's website: http://www.sociostudies.org/authors/rodrigue_b/)

Selected Bibliography

  • Voyages : a Maine Franco-American reader (2007)
  • Memoirs of Andrew J. Redmond, entrepreneur written by Andrew J. Redmond ; edited by Barry Rodrigue and Warren W. Strout (1995)
  • Tom Plant : the making of a Franco-American entrepreneur, 1859-1941 (1994)

Coffin, Bruce ( - )

Genre: Mystery, Short Stories

Author Bruce Robert Coffin is a retired detective sergeant with more than twenty-seven years in law enforcement. Born in Portland, Coffin grew up in Scarborough and attended the University of Southern Maine. He was hired as a police cadet by the Portland Police Department in 1985, retired in 2012 and now lives in Windham.

His short story Fool Proof, which appeared in Level Best Books anthology, Red Dawn: Best New England Crime Stories 2016, was recently named one of the twenty best mystery stories published in North America during 2015.

Bruce is a member of the Mystery Writers of America, Sisters In Crime New England, and the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance. He is also a regular contributor to the Maine Crime Writers Blog. (From the author's website:
http://www.brucerobertcoffin.com/)

Selected Bibliography

John Byron Mystery Series

  • Among the Shadows (2016)
  • Beneath the Depths (2017)
  • Beyond the Truth (2018)
  • Within Plain Sight (2020)

Campagnoli, Michael (1947 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry, Short Stories

Poet and author Michael Campagnoli was born in Bayonne, NJ. He received his BA from Franklin College and his PhD from Indiana University where he taught literature and writing. He has held a variety of jobs, including fisherman, journalist, and short-order cook. He has been a resident of Rockland, ME for 30 years.

His awards have included the New Letters Poetry Award, the All Nations Press Chapbook Award, and The Chiron Review Novella Prize. His fiction and poetry have appeared in New Letters, Nimrod, Southern Humanities Review, Rosebud, Rattle, Descant, Natural Bridge, Emerson Review, Blue Earth Review, Crab Creek, and elsewhere. He's published three chapbooks and his poems and stories have anthologized in Best New Writing of 2010, ISFN's Anthology 1, The Bethany Reader, Nothing to Declare, and America Is Not the World. Three of his poems have been nominated for a Pushcart Prize.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ah-meddy-ga 2005
  • Loons : the cycle 2008
  • Penobscot Voice : Kikukus 2008

Rich, Caroline (1824 - 1907)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Caroline W. D. Rich was born in Byron, Oxford County, Maine. She went to Cambridge (MA) High School and then the Seminary for Young Ladies in Charleston, MA. She wrote several noted books of poetry, a poem for the town of Turner's centennial, and short stories for children. She married Rev. Thomas Hill Rich, who was a professor at Bates College, and the couple lived in Lewiston.

Selected Bibliography

Persons, Alice (1952 - )

Genre: Poetry

Born in Waltham, MA, Alice Persons grew up in the Army and graduated from high school in Arlington, Va. She has a BA (1973) and an MA (1976) in English from the University of Oregon and JD from the University of Maine School of Law. She has lived in Maine since 1983 and in Westbrook since 1996. She is the editor and publisher of Moon Pie Press, which has published more than 90 books of poetry.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Sense of Place: Collected Maine Poems 2002
  • Be Careful What Your Wish For: Selected Poems 2003
  • Never Say Never 2004
  • A Moxie and a Moon Pie: The Best of Moon Pie Press edited with Nancy A. Henry 2005
  • Don't Be a Stranger: Poems 2007
  • Thank Your Lucky Stars 2011
  • Fancy Meeting You Here
  • The Wildest Peal: Contemporary Animal Poetry II 2015

D'Avanzo, Charlene (1947 - )

Genre: Mystery

Charlene D'Avanzo is an environmental mystery writer who lives in Yarmouth, Maine. She received her B.A. from Skidmore College and her Ph.D. through the Boston University Marine Program at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, MA. After thirty-plus years studying and teaching about marine ecology along the northeast coast, she turned to fiction as a way to engage readers in its stunning beauty and grave threats. Charlene is an award-winning environmental educator and avid sea kayaker. The first book in her Mara Tusconi Maine Oceanography mystery series, Cold Blood, Hot Sea, is a 2016 finalist in Foreward Review's Independent Mystery category.

Selected Bibliography

  • Cold Blood, Hot Sea (2016)
  • Demon Spirit, Devil Sea (2017)
  • Glass Eels, Shattered Sea (2020)

Krohn, Ellen Conant (1947 - 2019)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Ellen Conant Krohn was a native of Auburn, Maine and she graduated from Edward Little High School in 1965. She graduated from the University of Maine, Orono, with concentrations in English and Speech. After college, Ellen taught English and Public Speaking at Winthrop High School, and Edward Little High School. "Cogitations," is a chapbook of poetry. Ellen lived with her husband in Brewer, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Cogitations (2014)
  • Judge Alonzo Conant (1914-1962) : A Biography (2016)
  • Ruperta Helen Turner Conant : (1919-1997) : a pictorial biography (2019)

Other Resources

  • Obituaries published in the Bangor Daily News and the Lewiston Sun Journal

Thibodeau, Perley (1940(?) - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Author Perley J. Thibodeau was born and raised in Bangor, Maine and lived there for many years. He now lives in New York City.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Stalker Pressed Send (2011)
  • Lulu's Back in Town (2011)
  • Murder By Wrote (2011)
  • Copyright for Murder (2012)
  • Stalking a Killer Heigh Ho' The Merry O' the Murder in the Dell (2014)
  • Politics of Murder (2015)

Waugh, Charles (1943 - )

Genre:

Editor, author and college professor Charles G. Waugh received his B.S. from Syracuse University (1965), an M.A. from Syracuse University (1969), and a Ph.D. from Kent State University (1982). He has taught public speaking, mass media, introduction to psychology, and social psychology since 1965 at various institutions.

Selected Bibliography

  • Love, 3000 edited with Martin H. Greenberg (1980)
  • 101 Science Fiction Stories edited with Martin H. Greenberg and Jenny-Lynn Waugh. 1986
  • the Best Maine Stories: The Marvelous Mystery edited with Sanford Phippen and Martin G. Greenberg 1986
  • Strange Maine edited with Martin H. Greengerg and Frank D. McSherry, Jr. 1986
  • Tin Stars edited with Isaac Asimov & Martin H. Greenberg 1986
  • Western Series and Sequels: A Reference Guide edited with Bernard A. Drew and Martin H. Greenberg 1986
  • Young Witches and Warlocks edited with Isaac Asimov and Martin H. Greenberg 1987
  • Best Stories of Sarah Orne Jewett edited with Martin H. Greenberg and Josephine Donovan 1988
  • Haunted New England: Classic Tales of the Strange and Supernatural edited with Martin H. Greenberg & Frank D. McSherry, Jr. 1988
  • Mammoth Book of Classic Science Fiction: Short Novels of the 19303 edited with Isaac Asimov and Martin H. Greenberg 1988
  • Yankee Witches edited with Martin H. Greenberg & Frank D. McSherry, Jr.
  • Isaac Asimov Presents Tales of the Occult: Stories by H. G. Wells [Et Al.] edited with Isaac Asimov & Martin H. Greenberg 1989
  • Lighthouse Horrors: Tales of Adventure, Suspense, and the Supernatural edited with Martin H. Greenberg & Jenny-Lynn Azarian 1993
  • A Distant War Comes Home: Maine in the Civil War Era edited with Donald W. Beattie & Rodney M. Cole 1996
  • The Wicked-Good Dictionary of English, Media and the Arts 2004

O'Donnell, Patricia (1952 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Patricia O'Donnell, a resident of Wilton, teaches Fiction Writing in the University of Maine at Farmington's BFA Program in Creative Writing. She received her BA (1979) and her MA (1981) from the University of Northern Iowa and her MFA (1986 ) from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.

Her short fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, Agni Review, The North American Review, Prairie Schooner, Short Story, American Literary Review, and other journals and anthologies.

Selected Bibliography

  • Necessary Places (2012)
  • Waiting to Begin (2016)
  • Gods for Sale (2017)
  • Vigilance of Stars (2019)

Peters, Kellie (1966 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Kellie Peters was born in Florida and grew up in Vermont. She attended Johnson State College and has a bachelor of arts degree in elementary education as well as a masters degree in the education of gifted and talented students. She moved to Maine in 1997 and has taught at Camden-Rockport Elementary School ever since. She writes and illustrates books for children.

Selected Bibliography

  • Farming on the Sea (2013)

Singer, Paula ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Singer graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Maine, Orono, in 1966 and received her JD from the University of Maine School of Law in 1978. She has authored more than 80 published articles about taxes appearing in tax journals and in journals published by trade organizations, including the Massachusetts Bar Association, the American Immigration Lawyers Association, the American Payroll Association, and the National Association of Tax Professionals. 20 of her articles appeared in Tax Notes International (TNI), published by Tax Analysts. Singer was one of 48 contributors?one of only three women?to their 2010 book, 40 Years of Change, One Constant: Tax Analysts. Singer authored 11 tax guidebooks and more than 50 e-newsletter articles published by Windstar Publishing, Inc. (now owned by Thomson Reuters). International Aspects of Individual U.S. Tax Returns received a Bronze medal from Axiom Business Book Awards in 2008. In 2004, Windstar published Singer?s book, A Simple, More Efficient Tax Collection System for America. Her articles about tax reform appeared in the Christian Science Monitor and CSM?s online business journal, and in Tax Analysts? journals, Tax Notes and TNI, and their online World Tax Daily. She was one of 32 expert contributors?one of five women?to their 2009 publication, Toward Tax Reform: Recommendations for President Obama?s Task Force.

Selected Bibliography

  • When There is no Wind, Row: a Memoir (2017)

Huff, Dennis (1977 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Horror, Young Adult

Dennis Huff was born and raised in Owl's Head, ME. He graduated from the University of Maine at Farmington in 2007 with a BA in Geology/Chemistry.

Selected Bibliography

  • Undead (2015)
  • The Guardians (2015)
  • Megan and the Realm of the White Tiger (2017)
  • When Will You Come Home (2016)
  • Undead: Death is only the Beginning (2016)

Lepcio, Andrea ( - )

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film

Playwright and writing coach Andrea Lepcio is a Dramatists Guild Fellow, earned her M.F.A. in Dramatic Writing from Carnegie Mellon University and a B.A. in Human Ecology from College of the Atlantic. She lives in Bar Harbor, Maine and travels frequently.

Full Length Plays

  • Bottom of Nine
  • Dinner at Home Between Deaths
  • Eclipse
  • Hood and Eye
  • Looking for the Pony
  • Me You US Them
  • One Nation Under
  • Strait of Gibraltar
  • Tunnel Vision
  • World Avoided

Collaborations

  • Escape Code and other Projects
  • R U Nobody 2?
  • Steampunk Haunted House

Librettos

  • Ballad of Rom and Julz
  • The Bronx Casket Co.
  • Central Avenue Breakdown
  • The Gold
  • Lf&Tms
  • Room 16

Short Plays

  • Average Family Business
  • Can You Get My Cat Off My Ass?
  • Crossing Town
  • Do Over
  • Dyke Patrol
  • Get in the Car
  • How I Won the War
  • Looking for the Pony
  • Love's Lost and Found
  • The Macalfardongregintosh Twins
  • Night Night
  • Out There
  • Parched
  • Peace on Earth Goodwill to...
  • A Peddler's Tale: Buttons, Guts & Bluetooth
  • Second Kiss
  • Strangers in the Night
  • Sundays
  • Tumble Jumble
  • Under Huddlestone
  • The Wife Seller
  • Whodunit
  • Why Do Good Boobs Go Bad?

Lawrence, Mary (1959 - )

Genre: Mystery

Mary Lawrence is a historical mystery author who writes the Bianca Goddard Mysteries set in Tudor London. She grew up in Southern Indiana and attended Butler University, finishing at Indiana University, graduating with a specialty degree in Cytotechnology then moved to Maine. Except for a brief stint in Grad school in Western Massachusetts, She has made her home in Maine. Lawrence is the recipient of Suspense Magazine's "Best Historical Mystery Books" of 2015. Her articles have appeared in Portland Monthly, The Boston Book Review, and the national news blog--The Daily Beast.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Alchemist's Daughter (2015)
  • Death of an Alchemist (2016)
  • Death at St. Vedast (2017)
  • The Alchemist of Lost Souls (2019)
  • The Lost Boys of London (2020)

Torrington, Thomas (1980 - )

Genre: General Fiction

For the first twenty years of his adult life, Thomas J. Torrington made a career as a golf teaching professional.

Now he has transitioned into a life as a writer of literary fiction stories that explore the depths of the human condition.

When he'snot hitting 300 yard drives, he's hitting the ski slopes with his wife and two young children, or otherwise enjoying the outdoors near his home in rural Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Evergreen: A Novel (2017)
  • The Bear (2018)
  • Thunder Snow (2019)

Clements, Andrew (1949 - 2019)

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's author Andrew Clements has written more than 80 picture books and middle-grade novels.

He grew up mostly in New Jersey and Illinois but his family spent summers in Maine for years and, as a child, he spent summers in Hiram, ME. About 10 years ago, Clements and his wife, bought a vacation home on Hancock Pond in Denmark. Three years ago they moved from Westborough, MA to Baldwin, Maine year-round.

He graduated from Northwestern University and received his master's degree in teaching from National Louis University.

His first novel was Frindle, about a boy who invents a new word for pen and watches it become wildly popular. The book was a best-seller and has sold more than 6 million copies

Selected Bibliography

  • Frindle (1996)
  • Philipp's Birthday Book (1996)
  • Temple Cat (1996)
  • Double Trouble in Walla Walla (1997)
  • The Landry News (1999)
  • Workshop (1999)
  • The Janitor's Boy (2000)
  • Jake Drake Bully Buster (2001)
  • The School Story (2001)
  • Big Al and Shrimpy (2002)
  • The Jacket (2002)
  • The Last Holiday Concert (2004)
  • Lunch Money (2005)
  • The Report Card (2006)
  • Dogku (2007)
  • Lost and Found (2008)

Selected Links

-- Publishers Weekly Obituary

Meroff, Deborah (1948 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Deborah Meroff was born in Bath, Maine. She graduated from Pinkerton Academy in Derry, NH in 1966, earned a BA degree in Interpretive Speech from Bob Jones University in Greenville, SC (1970) and then an MLS at the University of Maine in Orono (1973). She has worked as a Circulation Librarian, Library Director, editor of a Christian magazine called Floodtide, and as a journalist/press officer for a Christian charity called OM International.

In 2014, Debbie retired and continues to enjoy freelance writing from her lakeside cottage in Sabbatus, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Coronation of Glory; The Story of Lady Jane Grey (1979)
  • Captain, My Captain (1986)
  • Footsteps in the Sea (1994)
  • Riding the Storm (1996)
  • The Touch of the Master (1998)
  • TRUE GRIT: Women Taking on the World, for God's Sake (2004)
  • EUROPE: Restoring Hope (2011)
  • Psalms from the Sea (2012)
  • Under Their Very Eyes: The Astonishing Life of Tom Hamblin (2016)
  • Maine Has Moxie! (2018)

Smith, Beulah (1915 - 2011)

Genre: Poetry

Beulah Federson Smith was born in Ogunquit and attended the Wells school system, graduating from Wells High School in 1932. She attended Colby College and graduated with a degree in English (1936).

Her poetry was published in many nationally distributed magazines and books. She also wrote the "Touchtone" column for The York County Coast Star.

Selected Bibliography

  • Heartwood: Poems (1964)

Selected Resources

Dempsey, Joan ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Award-winning author Joan Dempsey lives in New Gloucester, Maine with her partner and their family of animals. She attended Boston College (BS philosophy), Lesley University (MS Nonprofit Management) and Antioch University Los Angeles (MFA Fiction).

Winner of the 2017 Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award from Poets & Writers, and named by Poets & Writers magazine as one of "5 more over 50"? writers to watch, she is the author of the novel, This Is How It Begins, which won the bronze 2018 Independent Publisher Book Award for literary fiction. The novel is also a 2018 Lambda Literary Award finalist (gay fiction), 2017 Foreword Indies Book of the Year Award Finalist (historical fiction) and 2018 Sarton Women's Book Award finalist (contemporary fiction).

She was the recipient of a significant research grant from the Elizabeth George Foundation for her work on This Is How It Begins, a grant that took her to Warsaw for a month, and to Washington, D.C. for ten days to study in the archives at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Her writing has been published in The Adirondack Review, Alligator Juniper, Obsidian: Literature of the African Diaspora, and Plenitude Magazine, and aired on National Public Radio.

For more information, please see her website: http://thisishowitbeginsnovel.com/.

Plummer, Gayle (1949 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Gayle Plummer was raised in NH but returned to her birthplace in Maine as an adult and raised a family here. Her First book is an extension of my love of flowers.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Flower Patch Pals (2018)

Martin, Holly (1967 - )

Genre: Romance Novel

Holly Martin was born and raised in Maine. She considers herself a true Mainer through and through and captures the evocative setting through her writing.

Martin has always loved reading and was finally inspired to create her own stories.

Selected Bibliography

  • Princess (2017)

Cloutier Green, Kimberly (1955 - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet and teacher, Kimberly Cloutier Green is a former Lecturer at the University of New Hampshire, she is the 13th Poet Laureate of the City of Portsmouth, NH, and a MacDowell Fellow. She lives in Kittery Point, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Next Hunger (2013)
  • What Becomes of Words (2001)

Ford, John (1947 - 2018)

Genre: Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Born in Sanford, John A. Ford, Sr. served as a Maine game warden in Waldo County for 20 years. He kept a diary of that time which later translated into award-winning newspaper columns in The Republican Journal, then Village Soup, and Northwoods Sporting Journal as well as several books. He was great storyteller and shared his tales with appreciative audiences all over the state of Maine.

John died of cancer in 2018.

Bibliography

  • Deer Diaries: Tales of a Maine Game Warden (2015)
  • This Cider Still Tastes Funny!: Further Tales of a Maine Game Warden (2013)
  • Suddenly the Cider Didn't Taste So Good (2012)

Higgins, Ryan ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Native Mainer Ryan T. Higgins is a children's book author and illustrator who lives in Kittery, ME. In his younger days, he ran a landscaping business with his brother and folded shirts in the warehouse at the Kittery Trading Post. After studying art and wildlife biology at College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, Maine, he chose (rather than live in the woods and study grizzly bears) to become a children's book author/illustrator. Higgins won the 2016 Ezra Jack Keats Book Award for New Illustrator Honor and the E.B. White Read-Aloud Award for Picture Books for his first "Bruce" book, Mother Bruce.

Selected Bibliography

  • Twaddleton's Cheese (2008)
  • Wilfred (2013)
  • Be Quiet! (2017)
  • We Don't Eat Our Classmates! (2018)
  • We Will Rock Our Classmates! (2020)
  • What About Worms?! (2020) with Mo Willems

Bruce Books

  • Mother Bruce (2015)
  • Hotel Bruce (2016)
  • Bruce's Big Move (2017)
  • Santa Bruce (2018)
  • Bruce's Big Fun Day (2019)
  • Bruce's Big Storm (2019)
  • Peek-A-Bruce (2019)

Selected Websites

http://ryanthiggins.com/

Cohen, Ariella (1960 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Ariella Cohen is a graduate of Barnard College and the University of Michigan Law School. She makes her home in mid-coast Maine.

Select Bibliography

  • Sweet Breath of Memory (2016)

Moody, Roger (1943 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Roger Allen Moody was born in Waupaca, WI, graduated from Camden High School (1961), received his Bachelor of Arts from the University of Maine with a major in History and Government (1965), and his Master of Public Administration from Syracuse University's Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs (1969). He has a public administration career spanning 36 years as a municipal manager (Ellsworth and Camden), School Business Administration (Bangor), and County Commissioner (Knox County).

Select Bibliography

  • A Governmental History of the County of Knox, Maine 1860-2015 (2016)
  • Logging Towboats and Boom Jumpers, the Story of O.A. Harkness (2018)

Ray, Joyce (1945 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Joyce Ray was born in Portland, Maine and resides in Oakland, Maine from June through October. Ray attended the University of Maine at Orono, completed a BA degree at University College, Rutgers and an MFA in Writing at Vermont College of Fine Art.

Her YA historical fiction novel, Feathers & Trumpets, A Story of Hildegard of Bingen, (Apprentice Shop Books, 2014) won silver Moonbeam and Illumination awards. She co-authored Women of the Pine Tree State: 25 Maine Women You Should Know (2014) and contributed to other books in the America's Notable Women series.

Ray's poetry has appeared in The Aurorean, Entelechy International and in onlne literary journals. She was awarded a Vermont Studio Center Artist's Grant in 2008, and her entry for the 2014 Loft Poetry Prize was a finalist.

Selected Bibliography

  • Feathers and Trumpets: A Story of Hildegard of Bingen (2014)
  • Women of the Pine Tree State: 25 Maine Women You Should Know (2014)

Iftin, Abdi (1985 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Abdi Iftin grew up in war-torn Mogadishu, Somalia, fled to Kenya, and eventually won entrance to the U.S. in the annual visa lottery. He has written a memoir which has received high praise including The Boston Globe's 20 best books of 2018, and was shortlisted for Understanding American Books of the year of 2018. Abdi was also chosen Portland Monthly Magazine's ten intriguing people of the year 2018.

Abdi braved sending audio diaries while living in war-torn Somalia and as a refugee in Kenya. His stories of surviving all odds received much attention after his diaries aired on NPR and became one of "This American Life's" most listened audio podcasts entitled "Abdi and the Golden Ticket". Abdi's story is an essential immigrant story, enlightening and immediate. He lives in Freeport, Maine, attends USM in his third year of his bachelor's degree, and is on his path to citizenship in six months.

Selected Bibliography

  • Call Me American (2018)

Lynds, Gayle ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

New York Times bestseller Gayle Lynds is the award-winning author of 10 international spy novels, including The Assasssins, The Book of Spies, and The Last Spymaster. Her books have won numerous awards. Library Journal hails her as "the reigning queen of espionage fiction." The Associated Press calls her "a master of the Modern Cold War spy thriller." Her novel, Masquerade, was named by Publishers Weekly as one of the top 10 spy novels of all time. With Robert Ludlum, she created the Covert-One series. The first novel, The Hades Factor, was a CBS miniseries.

A member of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers, she is co-founder (with David Morrell) of International Thriller Writers and helped to design ThrillerFest held annually in New York City since 2007.

Married to retired Maine judge John C. Sheldon since 2011, she and her husband live on 14 forested acres in Westbrook, where both write. She's a board member of the Maine Writers and Publisher Alliance, and and chairs the Maine Crime Wave.

Please visit her at www.GayleLynds.com and read her blog posts at www.RogueWomenWriters.com

Carlson, Sarah (1957 - )

Genre: Poetry

As we all do, Sarah Carlson has many pieces to her whole. Those pieces include: mother, teacher, daughter, friend, widow, sister, skier, bicyclist, hiker, coach, drummer, and poet. Sarah lives in the western foothills of Maine where opportunities to make connections amid the splendor of the rivers, lakes and mountains are plentiful. She began writing and combining her poetry with photographs of her experiences in the natural world as part of healing from the sudden loss of her husband, Barry.

She published her first book, The Radiance of Change, in February of 2018. The book is a collection of 175 of her poems written over a 12 year period. Each piece is paired with a nature photograph taken during varied adventures in the great outdoors. In the preface, Sarah tells of the recognition of how broken her heart felt in the early days of her loss and how it led her to begin an intentional process of healing. The inner voice that emerged during this time has given rise to a piece of work that can be read from cover to cover or opened up to any page for a brief moment or two of grace, connection, and healing. It is a book about loss, but more accurately is about what one can gain from choosing to move into the complexities of grief and healing.

Rogoff, Seth (1976 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Seth Rogoff, ABD, MA, is a part-time member of the History faculty at USM Where he teaches online classes for the department and a part-time member of the faculty at the Maine College of Art where he teaches Academic Studies and Writing. He received his BA in Literature and History from Washington University in St. Louis (1999), his MA at Duke University (2003), and is currently ABD at the University of Amsterdam. He has also been a Fulbright Scholar in Berlin, Germany (2006-2007). He lives in Prague.

Select Bibliography

  • First the Raven: A Preface (2017)
  • Thin Rising Vapors (2018)

Kalloch, Jr., Norman (1944 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Norman Kalloch was born in Rockland Maine and has lived in various parts of the state during his 74 years. He is a 1966 graduate of the University of Maine and worked 34 years for the Natural Resources Conservation Service retiring in 2000. He and his wife Audrey live at West Carry Pond in Somerset County nine months of the year and winter in St. George, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Long Way to Walk - One Family's Tragic Journey Though the Maine Wilderness (2018)
  • 45th Parallel (2019)

Cram, Jr., Bob (1969 - )

Genre: Horror, Illustrator, Non-Fiction, Science Fiction/Fantasy

Bob Cram Jr is a writer, illustrator who lives in Gray, Maine. Although his past has included stints as an actor, cartoonist, comic book editor and web developer it's really not as interesting as it sounds. Except for working on the Incredible Hulk that one time. That was pretty cool.

Selected Bibliography

Fiction:

  • The Monster War (2013)

Non-fiction

  • 31 Days, 31 Horror Movies Vol 1

Illustration

  • Exiles
  • Incredible Hulk Annual #19
  • Runequest
  • Fantasy Hero
  • Damnation Decade
  • Big Bad Book
  • Task Force Alpha
  • 31 Days, 31 Horror Movies Vol 1
  • TORG: Revised & Expanded
  • Tales of the Bard

Kim, Melissa (1962 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Melissa Kim is the author of eight children's books. She lives in Cape Elizabeth with her family. She has worked as a writer and editor for more than twenty years in New York and London. Formerly the editorial director and children's and young adult book editor at Islandport Press, she has a BA from Brown University and a Masters from New York University. She is currently the Communications Director at Maine Audubon Society.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Little Brown Bat Story (2015)
  • A Snowy Owl Story (2015)
  • A Blanding's Turtle Story (2016)
  • A Monarch Butterfly Story (2017)

Magras, Diane (1974 - )

Genre: Young Adult

Diane Magras grew up on Mount Desert Island, ME and attended the College of the Atlantic. She writes books for young adults and her first, The Mad Wolf's Daughter, was a Lupine Award winner and a New York Times Editor's Choice. She lives in Southern Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Mad Wolf's Daughter (2018)
  • The Hunt for the Mad Wolf's Daughter (2019)

Pollock, Brenda (1961 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Brenda Pollock was born and raised in Madawaska, Maine. She moved to southern Maine where she began her career as a chamber of commerce executive director. Her profession led her to Montreal, Canada, when she accepted the role of VP of sales and marketing in the private aviation industry. Her first published work, HIGH HEELS to HIGH SEAS is her memoir of when she found her courage, kicked off her heels and left her glossy, corporate lifestyle to live, work, and travel, full time, aboard a 41-foot sailboat. She not only gained her sea legs but found what it really takes to live your dream.

Brenda has lived in Montreal, Nova Scotia, and Florida, and has traveled from port to port across the eastern seaboard. She is now employed with a Portland, Maine based credit union.

She is the mother of two sons, one daughter, three stepsons and Memere to five grandchildren. She and her husband reside in Saco, Maine.

Davidson, May (1929 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

May Davidson was born in Damariscotta, a charming fishing village located in midcoast Maine. In 1947, she graduated from Lincoln Academy, a private high school in the nearby town of Newcastle. She married her teenage sweetheart, James, a year later. Determined to stay in Maine, Davidson and her husband of sixty-eight years experimented with several entrepreneurial endeavors from creating a lobster trap building facility to raising purebred sheep before finding worldwide success with the design of the iconic Maine Buoy Bell. Today, she lives in Whitefield, Maine, and is known for her column in "The Lincoln County News".

Freeberg, Jane (1933 - 2019)

Genre: General Fiction

Author Jane Freeberg grew up in Queens, N.Y., and graduated from Adelphi College with a degree in English. Eventually she moved to Georgetown Island in Midcoast Maine where she resided for a large part of her life. She always had a love for stories, founding book clubs and serving on her library board. She also enjoyed telling stories of families living in her Queens neighborhood. She wrote her first book, The Scallop Christmas, at the age of 76 and said she regretted not getting into the business earlier. The book was based on a true story told to her by her friend Marcia, who lived most of the story. "It rattled around in my brain for 35 years, and when it came to mind, I'd think, 'That's a great story. I ought to write it down,' " she said. "I'm so glad I did."

Jalali, Reza ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Reza Jalali is a teacher, writer, and community organizer. Originally from Iran, he has lived in Maine for over two decades. When not working at the University of Southern Maine or playing soccer for fun, he writes stories, which especially delight his children. A sky watcher, he believes we each have a star named after us. He continues to search the night sky to find his and those of his family and friends.

Selected Bibliography

  • Moon Watchers: Shirin's Ramadan Miracle (2010)
  • Homesick Mosque (2013)
  • The Poets and the Assassin (2016)

Minter, Daniel ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Daniel Minter lived in Chicago and Brooklyn before moving to Portland, Maine where he now resides. From his base in Maine, Minter uses his art as a tool for dialogue with his community. He is the co-founder and creative visionary of the Portland Freedom Trail. Minter serves on the board of The Ashley Bryan Center, The Illustration Institute and teaches at the Maine College of Art. He serves as board chair of The Quaglia Institute for Student Aspirations.

Selected Bibliography

  • Seven Spools of Thread: A Kwanzaa Story written by Angela Shelf Medearis (2000)
  • The First Marathon: the Legend of Pheidippides by Susan Reynolds (2006)
  • Ellen's Broom by Kelly Starling Lyons (2012)
  • Going Down Home with Daddy written by Kelly Starling Lyons (2019)
  • So Tall Within: Sojourner Truth's Long Walk toward Freedom written by Gary D. Schmidt

Mulligan, Stephanie ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Author Stephanie Mulligan was born and raised in Otisfield, ME. She graduated from the University of Maine at Orono (BS Elementary Education and English). After a Summer job on a lobster fishing tour boat, she was inspired to write her first book.

Selected Bibliography

  • How to Catch a Keeper (2019)

Baumgardner, Sue (1950 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Born and raised in rural Maine of the 1950s, Sue Baumgardner subsequently spent several years living in various states across the eastern U.S. She moved back to Maine, family, old friends, and grandchildren Sue in her retirement. With the time she had always desired, Sue picked up pen, took a dozen classes in writing and now has authored five book-length manuscripts along with three ebooks, several short stories, and poetry. Her greeting cards with verse are sold across the world.

Sue Baumgardner writes in several genres to include: Middle Readers' Fiction, Literary Fiction, Poetry, and Self Help. Six of her paperbacks can be found on Amazon. Sue has had a short story published in Historic Maine and several poems published in "The Aurorian."

Bibliography

  • Ghosts Hosts: True Ghost Stories (2017)
  • Languid Lilies: The Language of Loss (2019)
  • Jean Alfred's New Home (2019)
  • Christmas Contemplations (Seasons) (2019)
  • He Would Not Forget: Not Ever (2019)
  • Where Sin Increased (2020)

Seekins, Brenda (1949 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Author Brenda Seekins is a lifelong resident of Maine -- born in Camden, she resides in Hartland. She was a reporter for the Bangor Daily News for 28 years and now works part-time as freelance reporter.

Selected Bibliography

  • Sebasticook Valley (2004)
  • Around Great Moose Lake (2006)
  • Milestones & Memories (?)

Michelson, Jere (1969 - )

Genre: Mystery

An accountant by training, author Jere Michelson received his bachelor's degree in accounting from the University of Southern Maine in Portland and his master's degree in taxation from Thomas College in Waterville. He lives in Scarborough, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Deadly Account (2018)

Duplisea, David (1959 - N/A)

Genre: Non-Fiction

David Duplisea currently resides in Millinocket.

Bibliography

  • Millinocket (2008)

Carbone, Tommy ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery, Non-Fiction

Tommy Carbone lives in Maine and writes from a one-room cabin on the shores of a northern Maine lake. He is an engineer (PhD), world traveler, writer, and lover of microbrews - not necessarily in that order.

He grew up Brooklyn playing street games and trying to stay out of trouble. It's all explained in his memoir - "Growing Up Greenpoint - A Kid's Life in 1970s Brooklyn," a book of fun stories that are full of heart.

Tommy splits his time between the coast of Maine and a one-room cabin in the north woods. He is currently working on a series of novels set in Maine and a world travel memoir.

Tommy has a PhD in management and has written a significant body of scholarly non-fiction.

Selected Bibliography

Fiction:

-The Lobster Lake Bandits' Mystery at Moosehead

Non-fiction:

-Growing Up Greenpoint: A Kid's Life in 1970s Brooklyn

Owen, Christopher (1959 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Christopher Owen served as a Sergeant in the 187th Infantry Brigade United States Army Reserves. Christopher currently resides in Standish, Maine. He has a bachelors degree in History, a diploma from the US Army Intelligence Center and School, and diploma from the Morris Pratt Institute. He lives in Standish, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Creation of the Southern Nation (2017)

Mikolyski, Robert (1972 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry

Robert Mikolyski is from Oldtown. Bob works as a DSP for Adults with Disabilities. He has been featured in Eber & Wein Publishing's Best Poets of 2015 and This Time Around, Safe Harbor His Poetry has circulated throughout Maine in The Poets Corner "Articles of the Eagle Magazine."

Bibliography

Walking About-hiking into the human spirit (2019)

Gardner, Carol (1954 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Author Carol Gardner earned a Ph.D. in English from The Johns Hopkins University, taught at Johns Hopkins, Wake Forest, and Florida State Universities, and has published pieces in a wide variety of books and periodicals, including the World of Baseball series, "BluePlanet Quarterly," "The Women's Review of Books," "Portland Press Herald," and "The Washington Post." She is a native of Portland, Maine and currently lives in Alna, Maine.

Bibliography

  • The Involuntary American: A Scottish Prisoner's Journey to the New World (2019)

Fleming, Bruce ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Bruce Fleming grew up in the Katahdin Region of Maine where he currently lives.

Bibliography

  • Thoughts (2002)
  • Beach Town Blues (2003)
  • The Bangor Blues (2006)
  • The Katahdin Blues (2006)
  • Pressing Matters (2020)

Watson, Amy (1977 - )

Genre: General Fiction

A. M. Watson is a teacher, attorney, and author. She lives in the island community of Vinalhaven, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Infants of the Brush: A Chimney Sweep's Story (2017)

Westgate, Reed (1981 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Science Fiction/Fantasy

Reed Logan Westgate was born in Sanford, Maine and attended college in Dover, New Hampshire where he studied Accounting and Finance. He currently works for a non-profit social service agency in the finance department. In his spare time, he enjoys tabletop gaming, roleplaying games, and fishing.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Infernal Games (The Baku Series Book 1) (2020)

Spencer, Robert ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Author Robert W. Spencer lives in Waterford, Maine. He is a graduate of the University of Massachusetts (Amherst) and Radcliffe Landscape Design Seminars (now Boston Architectural College) and ran a design/build residential garden practice in the greater Boston area for many years.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Spinster's Hope Chest (2018)
  • Prospects (2020)

Bragg, John ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

John Bragg, a renowned climber and mountaineer, was one of the pioneers in the free climbing revolution in the US in the 1970's, and the development of modern ice climbing techniques in New Hampshire. He is a graduate of Harvard University and is currently working on his third novel, a dark mystery that takes place in the hills of New Hampshire. He lives in Rockport.

Selected Bibliography

  • Broom of God (2015)
  • Exit 8 (2019) Maine Book Award Finalist

Brown, Jason (1969 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

Jason Brown was born in Hallowell, grew up in Maine, attended Bowdoin College (1991) and earned an MFA in creative writing from Cornell University. In 1996, he received a Stegner Fellowship to study creative writing at Stanford University. He writes primarily about Maine and New England and his fiction has appeared in magazines and anthologies including Harper's, The Atlantic and The Best American Short Stories. Brown taught creative writing at Stanford University and at the University of Arizona's creative writing MFA program. He is an associate professor at the University of Oregon's creative writing MFA program.

Selected Resources

  • A Faithful but Melancholy Account of Several Barbarities Lately Committed (2019) Maine Book Award Finalist

Anderson, Cynthia ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Short Stories

A sixth-generation native of Maine, Cynthia B. Anderson was born in Bangor and raised in a village on the Androscoggin River. She earned her M.S. in Journalism from Boston University where she now teaches. Her short stories have appeared in The Iowa Review, North American Review, Pleiades, Flash Fiction Forward, The Masters Review and elsewhere. Prizes include the New Millennium Award and the Mark Twain Award for short fiction. Her nonfiction has appeared in The Christian Science Monitor, Redbook, Boston Magazine, Huffington Post, Fourth Genre, The Miami Herald, Brevity, Forbes.com, and others

Anderson lives in Maine and in Boston.

Selected Bibliography

  • Home Now (2019) Maine Book Award Finalist

Case, Kristen (1976? - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Kristen Case, Assistant Professor of English at the University of Maine, Farmington, teaches courses in American Literature, environmental writing, and the intersection of poetry and philosophy. She received her BA from Columbia University (1998), her MFA from City University of New York (2003), her MED from Bank Street College of Education (2000) and her PhD from City University of New York (2009). She has published articles on Henry David Thoreau, Robert Frost and Ezra Pound. Her poems have appeared in Chelsea, The Brooklyn Review, Pleiades, Saint Ann's Review and The Iowa Review.

Selected Bibliography

  • American Pragmatism and Poetic Practice: Crosscurrents from Emerson to Susan Howe (2011)
  • Little Arias (2016) Maine Literary Award for Poetry
  • Principles of Economics (2018) Gatewood Prize

Lewis, Michelle ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet Michelle Lewis has worked as a writer, editor, and digital marketer. Her poetry has appeared in many journals, including Bennington Review, Indiana Review, Spoon River Poetry Review, and Denver Quarterly, and her reviews and essays have appeared in Gettysburg Review, Electric Lit, and Rain Taxi among others. She is a contributing writer for Anomaly. She earned her MFA from the Stonecoast Creative Writing Program. She lives in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Desire Line: Poems (2006)
  • Animul/Flame (2019)

Lane, Russie ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Russie Lane is an author, film maker and reluctant story-teller. He was born, raised and lives on the coast of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Snow Angels on the Moon

Coppens, Katie ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Katie Coppens writes both fiction and nonfiction for children. Katie's background as a middle school science and English teacher has a great influence on her writing. She received both her BA and MAT from the University of New Hampshire. She lives in Brunswick, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Geology is a Piece of Cake (2017)
  • The Acadia Files: Summer Science (2018)
  • The Acadia Files: Autumn Science (2018)
  • The Acadia Files: Winter Science (2019)
  • Geometry is Easy as Pie (2019)
  • The Acadia Files: Spring Science (2020)

Navicky, Jefferson (1975 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Jefferson Navicky is a cross-genre writer whose work been published in a variety of journals and whose plays have been produced across New England. Jefferson works as archivist for the Maine Women Writers Collection and teaches English at Southern Maine Community College. His writing has been recognized with a Maine Arts Commission Good Idea Grant and a Maine Literary Award in Drama, and he was the 2019 winner of the Maine Postmark Poetry Contest. He lives in Freeport.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Paper Coast (2018)
  • The Book of Transparencies (2018)

Weiss, Malcom ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Author Malcolm E. Weiss lives in North Whitefield, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • 666 Jellybeans! All That?: An Introduction to Algebra (1976)
  • Seeing Through the Dark: Blind and Sighted - a Vision Shared (1976)
  • Why Glass Breaks, Rubber Bends, and Glue Sticks: How Everyday Materials Work (1977)
  • One Sea, One Law?: The Fight for a Law of the Sea (1982)
  • Far Out Factories: Manufacturing in Space (1984)
  • Toxic Waste: Clean Up or Cover Up (1984)

Selected Resources

Hinrichs, Alexandra (1984 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Alexandra Hinrichs is a children's book author. Alex has worked as a historical researcher at American Girl, a children's librarian, and a children's bookseller among other things. She earned MAs in United States History and Library & Information Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She completed her undergraduate education at Colgate University, where she majored in History and French. Alex grew up in Princeton, Massachusetts. She has also lived in France and Thailand. She now makes her home in Bangor, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Therese Makes a Tapestry (2016)

Douglas, Alice (1865 - 1943)

Genre: Children's Literature, Poetry

Alice May Douglas was born in Bath, Maine on June 28, 1865. She was first published at the age of 11; at 13 she was inspired to become an author after reading Little Women. She contributed poetry and prose to periodicals including the Zion's Herald, Pacific Banner, and the Acorn. In addition to writing for children, Douglas was a peace activist, active in the Women's Christian Temperance Union.

Selected Bibliography

Poetry

  • Phlox (1888)
  • May Flowers 1888)
  • Gems Without Polish (1890)

Prose for Children

  • Jewel Gatherers
  • Quaker John in the Civil War
  • How the Little Cousins Formed a Museum
  • The Peace-Makers
  • Self-exiled from Russia

Selected Resources

  • [Correspondence with the Maine State Library(https://digitalmaine.com/mainewriterscorrespondence/223/)

Trusiani, Lisa (1959 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Lisa Trusiani grew up in Maine and attended the Harrison Lyseth School in Portland, and in Cumberland, the Mabel I Wilson School, Greely Junior High and Greely High School. She attended Bowdoin College from 1977 to 1981, graduating magna cum laude. She then lived in NYC, working simultaneously as a comics writer for Marvel Entertainment and King Features Syndicate, and as a freelance copywriter, completing over 1000 projects for American Express.

Lisa lives in Falmouth.

Selected Bibliography

  • American Trailblazers: 50 Remarkable People Who Shaped U.S. History (2019) Lupine Award Recipient
  • The Story of George Washington (2020)
  • The Story of Thomas Jefferson (2020)

Anthony, Jessica (1974 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Jessica Anthony was born in upstate New York in a small agricultural community sandwiched between a Native American reservation and a cutlery factory. Her fiction has appeared in Best New American Voices, Best American Nonrequired Reading, McSweeney's, Mid-American Review, New American Writing, and elsewhere. She is the winner of the Amanda Davis Highwire Fiction Award, the Summer Literary Seminars fiction contest, and has been a fellow at the MacDowell Colony, the Millay Colony, the Ucross Foundation, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. She lives in Portland, Maine

Selected Bibliography

  • The Convalescent (2009)
  • Enter the Aardvark (2020)

Anthony, Jessica (1974 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Jessica Anthony was born in upstate New York in a small agricultural community sandwiched between a Native American reservation and a cutlery factory. Her fiction has appeared in Best New American Voices, Best American Nonrequired Reading, McSweeney's, Mid-American Review, New American Writing, and elsewhere. She is the winner of the Amanda Davis Highwire Fiction Award, the Summer Literary Seminars fiction contest, and has been a fellow at the MacDowell Colony, the Millay Colony, the Ucross Foundation, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. She lives in Portland, Maine

Selected Bibliography

  • The Convalescent (2009)
  • Enter the Aardvark (2020)

Atkinson, Elizabeth (1961 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Young Adult

Elizabeth Atkinson was born in RI, lived for a short time in NC, grew up in a small village in New England and now splits her time between the North Shore of MA and a cabin in the ME woods near Kezar Lake. She majored in Anthropology at Hobart & William Smith Colleges and completed my Master of Arts in Liberal Studies (MALS) with a focus in creative writing at Dartmouth College. She has been freelance writing for many years, worked in publishing, taught English Literature, as well as held positions as a children's librarian and co-executive director of a local arts foundation. She is also certified as an ESL instructor and taught in Hangzhou, China.

Selected Bibliography

  • From Alice to Zen and Everyone in Between (2008)
  • I, Emma Freke (2010)
  • The Sugar Mountain Snow Ball (2015)
  • The Island of Beyond (2016)
  • Fly Back Agnes (2020) Winner of the 2020 International Book Award for Childrens Fiction

Blaydon, Cheryl ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

New York native Cheryl Blaydon is an artist, author and former businesswoman and world traveler. She lives in East Boothbay, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Memory Keepers (2011)
  • Dancing at the Colony (2020)

Boxer, Elisa ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Elisa Boxer graduated from Bowdoin College and received her graduate education at Columbia University. She has worked as an award-winning newspaper journalism, emmy-winning television journalism and as a journalism instructor at the University of Southern Maine's English Department.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Voice that Won the Vote (2020)

Bright, Sarah ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Nobleboro resident and author Sarah Stiles Bright teaches college English and writes from Portland, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maine Lakes (2002)
  • Wind Bird: Gift of the Mists (2006)
  • Gloria's Big Problem (2020)

Cameron, Josephine ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Josephine Cameron grew up writing and singing in Northern Wisconsin but currently lives in Maine, where she writes fiction for young readers and teaches music and songwriting to K-8 students. Josephine received her MFA in creative writing from the University of Notre Dame.

Selected Bibliography

  • Maybe a Mermaid (2019)
  • A Dog-Friendly Town (2929)

Chalmers, Rae ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Author and educator Rae Chalmers has lived and taught on several Maine islands. She now lives on one in Casco Bay, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bear and the Oxbow Island Gang (2020)

Chamberlin, Holly ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Author Holly Chamberlin lives in Portland, Maine. She was born and grew up in the Bronx and later lived in Brooklyn and Manhattan. She earned an undergraduate and graduate degree in English Literature at New York University before going on to work as an editor in publishing and packaging at Ballantine Books, Daniel Weiss Associates, Inc., and Kensington Publishing Corporation. She now writes full time.

Selected Bibliography

  • Living Single (2002)
  • The Summer of Us (2004)
  • Back in the Game (2006)
  • The Friends We Keep (2007)
  • Tuscan Holiday (2008)
  • One Week in December (2009)
  • The Family Beach House (2010)
  • Summer Friends (2011)
  • Last Summer (2012)
  • The Summer Everything Changed (2013)
  • The Beach Quilt (2014)
  • Summer with My Sisters (2015)
  • Home for Christmas (2017)
  • Home for the Summer (2017)
  • The Summer Nanny (2018)
  • The Wedding on the Beach (2019)
  • All Our Summers (2020)
  • Seashell Season (2020)

Cleaves, Herb ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction

Herb Cleaves is the son of railroad employees and worked his way through college and beyond as a trackman and station agent-operator. He became a reporter for a Maine daily newspaper where he also served as a bureau chief and copy and layout editor during a 25-year career. Herb has written numerous articles for various magazines and has been associated with a weekly newspaper on the coast of Maine for 16 years where he recently wrote a weekly column.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bangor and Aroostook: The Maine Railroad (1986)
  • High Green: The Story of an Irish-American Railroader (2019)

Creech, Sharon ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Sharon Creech was born and grew up in Ohio. She studied literature and writing courses in college and became a teacher (high school English and writing) in England and in Switzerland. She now lives in Camden, ME and writes books for young people.

Selected Bibliography

  • Walk Two Moons Newbery Award Winner (1994)
  • Absolutely Normal Chaos (1995)
  • Pleasing the Ghost (1996)
  • Chasing Redbird (1997)
  • Bloomability (1998)
  • The Wanderer (2000)
  • Love That Dog (2001)
  • Granny Torrelli Makes Soup (2003)
  • A Fine, Fine School (2001)
  • Fishing in the Air (2000)
  • Heartbeat (2004)
  • Who's That Baby? (2005)
  • Replay (2005)
  • The Castle Corona (2007)
  • Hate That Cat (2008)
  • The Unfinished Angel (2009)
  • The Boy on the Porch (2013)
  • Saving Winslow (2019)
  • One Time (2020)

Culley, Betty ( - )

Genre: Young Adult

Betty Culley is an RN who worked as an obstetrics nurse and as a pediatric home hospice nurse. She lives in central Maine, where the rivers run through the small towns.

Selected Bibliography

  • Three Things I Know are True (2020)

Doyon, Samara ( - )

Genre:

Samara Cole Doyon is both a second-generation Haitian American and a deeply rooted Mainer, with half of the roots of her family tree reaching generations deep into the soil of the Pine Tree State. She is a freelance writer, teacher, wife, and mother. She has been a regular contributor at Black Girl In Maine Media and has been featured in the "Deep Water" poetry column of the Portland Press Herald. She is a freelance writer, a teacher, a wife, and a mother, holding a BA in English from the University of Southern Maine and currently working on a Masters in Teaching in Learning. She lives in Portland, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Magnificent Homespun Brown: a Celebration illustrated by Kaylani Juanita (2020)

Drago, Irene ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Award-winning author Irene M. Drago grew up in a Navy family. Before moving to Maine, she worked for the Defense Department as a Russian analyst, earned a Master of Arts degree in Spanish language and literature, and taught at the high school and college level. Ms. Drago is the recipient of a Next Generation Indie Book Award and a Spirit of Bath Award. She lives in Bath, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Daughters of Long Reach (2017)
  • The Maine Point (2020)

Dunlap, Keith ( - )

Genre: Young Adult

Poet Keith Dunlap received his M.F.A. from the University of Montana. He is a former co-editor of The Columbia Review and former co-editor of Cutbank. His poems have been accepted for publication in Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, The Brooklyn Review, The Carolina Quarterly, The Georgetown Review, Poet Lore, and Sou'wester, among others. He lives in Portland, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Storyland (2016)

Flowers, Jack ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Jack Flowers was born near the end of World War II outside Indianapolis, Indiana. He was drafted and attended Officer's candidate School and served in the Army Corps of Engineers stationed near Saigon. He volunteered to be the leader of the 1st Infantry Division Tunnel Rats. After leaving the army, he returned to college and graduated with a degree in Mathematics and Economics and worked on Wall Street as well as a stockbroker and investment banker. Semi-retired, he has been living in Maine with his family since 2002.

Selected Bibliography

  • Rat Six (2018)

Ford, Richard (1944 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

Author Richard Ford was born in Jackson, Mississippi. He received a B.A. degree from Michigan State University and a Master of Fine Arts Degree from the University of California, Irvine (1970). He has won both the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. as well as winner of the Rea Award for the Short Story, He lives in East Boothbay, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Sportswriter (1986)
  • Wildlife (1990)
  • Independence Day winner of the Pulitzer, PEN/Faulkner Awards (1995)
  • A Multitude of Sins (2002)
  • The Lay of the Land (2006)
  • Canada: A Novel (2012)
  • Let Me Be Frank With You (2014)
  • Between Them: Remembering My Parents (2017)
  • Sorry For Your Trouble (2020)

Gibbon, Emma ( - )

Genre: Horror, Poetry, Short Stories

Emma J. Gibbon is originally from Yorkshire in the U.K. and now lives in Midcoast Maine. She is a Rhysling-nominated speculative poet, horror writer and librarian. Her debut fiction collection, Dark Blood Comes from the Feet, is out now from Trepidatio Publishing. Her stories have appeared in the Toasted Cake podcast, The Muse & The Flame and the New England Horror Writers anthologies, Wicked Haunted and Wicked Weird. She also has a story upcoming in Would but Time Await: An Anthology of New England Folk Horror. Her poetry has been published in Strange Horizons, Liminality, Pedestal Magazine, Kaleidotrope and Eye to the Telescope.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dark Blood Comes from the Feet (2020)

Glubka, Shirley (1942 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Poet Shirley Glubka was born in Washington, D.C. She is a retired psychotherapist and lives in Prospect, Maine. She attended Cathedral Grade School and Cotter High School, both in Winona, Minnesota and the College of St. Teresa, also in Winona, Minnesota, earning a B.A. in English and Philosophy. She also graduated from the Chicago Public Schools Practical Nursing Program as a Licensed Practical Nurse, received her M.A. in Clinical Psychology from the Fielding Institute, Santa Barbara, CA. and from the University of Maine at Orono, an M.A. in English & Creative Writing. She lives in Prospect, ME. Most of her poetry is self-published but has also been included in A Dangerous New World: Maine Voices on the Climate Crisis, Balancing Act 2: An Anthology of Poems by 50 Maine Women, Lesbians at Mid-life: the Creative Transition, Mothers Who Leave: the myth of women without their children, Naming: poems by 8 women (under the name Shirley Starkweather), North by Northeast: New Short Fiction by Writers from Maine and New England, Women in Culture: a Women's Studies Anthology and in the following journals: 2River View, Conditions, The Ekphrastic Review, Feminist Studies, The Ghazal Page, h.o.m.e. Words, Narramissic Notebook, Philosophy in the Contemporary World, Puckerbrush Review, Seems, Sinister Wisdom, Sun Dog: the Southeast Review, The Cafe Review, Tipton Poetry Journal, and Unlost Journal.

Selected Bibliography

  • Reflections Caught Leaping: poetry and related prose (2020)
  • Burst Thought Shall Show Its Root (2019)
  • Through the Fracture in the I: Erasure Poetry (2018)
  • The Bright Logic of Wilma Schuh: a novel (2017)
  • End into Opening: six sestinas and their humble companion poems (2014)
  • Echoes and Links: poems (2013)
  • Return to a Meadow: a novel (2012)
  • All the Difference: poems of unconventional motherhood (2012)
  • Green Surprise of Passion: Writings of a Trauma Therapist (1998)

Grundstrom-Whitney, Jason (1960 - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet Jason Grundstrom-Whitney was born in Maine and raised in California, Arizona and Maine. He attended Winthrop and Readfield schools and graduated from Maranacook High School in 1978. A graduate of the University of Southern Maine, he has been a substance abuse counselor and specialist at Riverview Psychiatric Center in Augusta, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Bear, Coyote, Raven (2019)

Harawitz, Alan ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Alan Harawitz has lived in southern Maine for almost ten years, having retired after more than 31 years as a social studies and language arts teacher in the New York City public school system. In the 1960s he wrote about his travels around the United States and Canada for Trailer Life magazine. Widely-published, Alan's poems have been in more than 100 publications including Rattle, Poet Lore, Hanging Loose, Fugue, Pivot, Open Spaces, Pearl, Roanoke Review, California Quarterly, Red Wheelbarrow and Main Street Rag, among others.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Day I Met Ava Gardner: Poems (2019)

Hayes, Jonathan ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction, Poetry

Originally from Tennessee, Hayes moved to northern Maine more than 20 years ago Hayes is a United States Postal Service carrier in Madawaska and breeds Seppala Siberian sled dogs.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mush: The Parable of the Dogsled Team (2010)
  • The True Tails of Togo the Sled Dog! (2019)

Hollis, Lee ( - )

Genre: Mystery

Hollis, Lee

SEE: Copp, Rick AND Simason, Holly

Simason, Holly ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Holly Simason lives in Bar Harbor, ME and is an award-winning columnist for the Mount Desert Islander. She and her brother Rick Copp are a writing team who author mysteries under the pseudonym Lee Hollis. They are both natives of Bar Harbor and graduates of Mount Desert Island High School

Selected Bibliography

Hayley Powell Series

  • Death of a Country Fried Redneck (2012)
  • Death of a Kitchen Diva (2012)
  • Death of a Coupon Clipper (2013)
  • Death of a Chocaholic (2014)
  • Death of a Christmas Caterer (2014)
  • Death of a Cupcake Queen (2015)
  • Death of a Bacon Heiress (2016)
  • Death of a Pumpkin Carver (2016)
  • Death of a Lobster Lover (2017)
  • Death of a Cookbook Author (2018)
  • Death of a Wedding Cake Baker (2019)
  • Death of a Blueberry Tart (2020)

Maya and Sandra Mysteries

  • Death at the PTA (2020)

Poppy Harmon Series

  • Poppy Harmon Investigates (2018)
  • Poppy Harmon and the Hung Jury (2020)

Copp, Rick ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Screenwriter and author Rick Copp is a native of Bar Harbor, ME and graduated from Mount Desert Island High School.

Selected Bibliography

Written as Rick Copp

  • The Actors Guide to Murder (2003)
  • The Actor's Guide to Adultery
  • The Actors Guide to Greed (2005)
  • Fingerprints & Facelifts

Written as Lee Hollis

Hayley Powell Series

  • Death of a Country Fried Redneck (2012)
  • Death of a Kitchen Diva (2012)
  • Death of a Coupon Clipper (2013)
  • Death of a Chocaholic (2014)
  • Death of a Christmas Caterer (2014)
  • Death of a Cupcake Queen (2015)
  • Death of a Bacon Heiress (2016)
  • Death of a Pumpkin Carver (2016)
  • Death of a Lobster Lover (2017)
  • Death of a Cookbook Author (2018)
  • Death of a Wedding Cake Baker (2019)
  • Death of a Blueberry Tart (2020)

Maya and Sandra Mysteries

  • Death at the PTA (2020)

Poppy Harmon Series

  • Poppy Harmon Investigates (2018)
  • Poppy Harmon and the Hung Jury (2020)

Hunt, Edward ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery, Short Stories

Edward Daniel Hunt has an undergraduate degree from the University of New Haven and a graduate degree from Lesley University. His short stories have appeared in the Scarlett Leaf Review,Down in the Dirt Magazine and Adelaide Literary Magazine. Hit Men Have Feelings, Too was named a finalist in Adelaide Magazine's 2018 Literary Award Contest for Best Short Story. He lives in Old Orchard Beach, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Penance: A Novel (2020)

Irvine, Alex (1969 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Short Stories

Irvine has a B.A. from the University of Michigan (1991), an M.A. from the University of Maine (1996), and a Ph.D. from the University of Denver (2003). From 2005-11, he was an assistant professor of English at the University of Maine. He also worked for a time as a reporter at the Portland Phoenix. He was until recently a professor at the University of Southern Maine. He lives in Portland, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Scattering of Jades (2002)
  • One King, One Soldier (2004)
  • The Narrows (2005)
  • The Life of Riley (2005)
  • Buyout- (2009)
  • Mare Ultima (2012)
  • Anthropocene Rag (2020)

Krichels, Hans ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

A conservationist and holder of advanced degrees in literature and linguistics, Hans Krichels is a former jouranalist and field worker for The Dictionary of American Regional English. He currently lives in Bucksport, Maine. In 1971, Hans abandoned an academic career and moved to Maine. He and his family were part of what came to be known as the Homesteading Movement, inspired in part by the writings of Scott and Helen Nearing and the publication of something called The Whole Earth Catalogue. Hans has worked at various jobs - as a teacher, a newspaper reporter, a mason's tender, a signmaker, a woodcarver, and a mentor. Hes been deeply involved in The Great Pond Mountain Conservation Trust in Orland Maine, where hes run programs for children and serves as photographer for various events and meetings.

Selected Bibliography

  • Willie Knows Who Done It: Reports from the Byways of Maine (2020)

Miller, Marty ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Author and educator Marty Martin Miller has lived in Southern Maine for more than two decades. Raised in Danville, Indiana, she earned education degrees from Indiana State University and Indiana University. After teaching over forty years in four states, Marty still volunteers in local schools.

Selected Bibliography

  • Masterson's Magical Merry-Go-Round (2020) with Eleanor Morris Botka and illustrated by Laura Lander

Morelli, Licia ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction, Poetry

Licia Morelli's writing has been featured in Vanity Fair, The Boston Globe, Publisher's Weekly, The Rumpus, elephant journal, read.poetry, ARTS Magazine, Maine Media Workshops + College, John's Hopkins University Press and more. She is also a poet and prose writer working on her MFA at Vermont College of Fine Arts and has worked as an editorial director in the online marketing industry for over 10 years. She lives on the coast of Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Lemonade Hurricane: A Story of Mindfulness and Meditation (2015)
  • I Am Darn Tough! (2020)

Neily, Sandra ( - )

Genre: Mystery

Sandra Neily grew up in East Boothbay,Maine. She has spent most of her adult life working in the conservation field, sometimes in paid communications positions, sometimes as a citizen activist. She has served on the Economic Growth Council, the Northern Forest Sustainability Initiative Steering Committee, the Citizen's Advisory Committee to the Northern Forest Lands Council, and the Maine Department of Conservation Public Advisory Committee. She lives on Moosehead Lake.

Selected Bibliography

Mystery in Maine Series

  • Deadly Trespass (2017)
  • Deadly Turn (2020)

Oleson, Anne ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Anne Britting Oleson earned her degrees from Bowdoin College and the Stonecoast MFA program. She has published poems, short stories, book reviews, essays and photographs, as well as two poetry chapbooks. She is a founding member of Simply Not Done, a women's reading, writing and teaching collaborative and for many years she has taught writing at the high school level, as well as for the Meadowbrook Farm Writing Series and for Old Schoolhouse Writing Workshops. She lives in the mountains of Central Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Church of St. Materiana: Poems (2007)
  • The Beauty of It: Poems (2015)
  • The Book of the Mandolin Player (2015)
  • Dovecote (2017)
  • Tapiser (2018)
  • Cow Palace (2020)

Panepinto, Lisa (1983 - )

Genre: Poetry

Lisa Panepinto was born in Spokane, WA. She holds degrees from Washington State University and the University of Southern Maine. Her writing has appeared in The Glassblock, HEArt-Human Equity through Art, Maintenant, Pittsburgh City Paper, Red Flag Poetry, Yes, Poetry and more. She has served as a mentor and a senior companion with the United Way and as an AmeriCorps VISTA, and received the President's Volunteer Service Award. Panepinto was poet-in-residence for the Maine Writing Project and led spoken word and poetry workshops for youth in foster care, teachers, and Maine-Wabanaki REACH allies. She is poetry editor for Cabildo Quarterly and author of On This Borrowed Bike and the chapbook Island Dreams. She lives in Bangor, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Where I Come From the Fish Have Souls (2019)

Pearson, Dana (1964 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Dana Pearson was born in Springfield, MA and raised in neighboring Longmeadow. In 1979 his family moved to Maine, where he graduated from Kennebunk High School three years later. He received his BA in English Literature from Gettysburg College. He joined the York County Coast Star in 1994 and left the paper in 2007 to pursue writing fiction full-time. He earned awards from both the Maine and New England press associations for his work as a humor columnist, reporter, and editor. He lives in Kennebunk and contributes humor columns and features to Tourist & Town (touristandtown.com).

Selected Bibliography

  • Three Boat Lengths (2019)
  • Viewers Like Your (2019)

Perry, Theodore (1938 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Theodore A. Perry (a.k.a. Tony Perry) hails from upcountry Maine and lives in the Midcoast area. He holds a B.A. summa cum laude from Bowdoin, an M.A. in French and a Ph.D. in Romance Studies, both from Yale University. He has published 13 books on literature and philosophy, and he loves collecting yarns for his own ongoing "Perry Home Companion."

Selected Bibliography

  • Erotic Spirituality: The Integrative Tradition From Leone Ebreo To John Donne [1980]
  • State Of Maine State Of Mind: Upcountry Humor And Stories [2019]

Potter, Ellen (1963 - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Children's author Ellen Potter was born and raised in New York City. She lives in Castine, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Piper Green and the Fairy Tree (2015)
  • Too Much Good Luck (2015)
  • Going Places (2017)
  • Big Foot and Little Foot (2018)
  • The Squatchicorns (2019)

Powell, Steven ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, General Fiction

Author Steven D. Powell is a life-long resident of Midcoast Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Patch Scratching: A Novel (2011)
  • Bear Moonlight Sonata (2015)
  • Moe Pea the Moose Grows Up (2019)

Reef, Pat ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Pat Davidson Reef is a graduate of Emerson College in Boston. She received a Master's Degree in Education at the University of Southern Maine and taught English and Humanities at Catherine McAuley High School in Portland for many years. Now retired, she is a professional journalist and reviewer of museums, gallery exhibits, and books. She also teaches part-time at the University of Southern Maine to senior citizens in the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI). Her greatest loves are teaching and writing. She is a former member of the Maine State Arts Commission and a current member of both the Portland Museum of Art. She lives in Falmouth, ME.

Selected Bibliography

Maine Art Series for Young Readers

  • Bernard Langlais: Sculptor (1985)
  • Dahlov Ipcar: Artist (1987, 2016)
  • Bernard Langlais Revisited (2019)
  • David C. Driskell: Artist, Educator, Author (2020)

Ristino, Robert ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Robert J. Ristino, Ph.D., APR, Fellow PRSA is retired from the faculty at Roger Williams University. Dr. Ristino served for more than 20 years as adjunct faculty in the graduate programs in the College of Professional and Continuing Education (COPACE) at Clark University. He has also served as adjunct faculty at Boston University, Simmons College, and Worcester State and Fitchburg State Universities. He worked in public relations management positions serving such diverse organizations as General Electric and the UMassMemorial Health System. Dr. Ristino's main academic interests continue to be consulting, research, writing, lecturing and teaching about organizational communication, culture and change management. He lives in Swanville, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dogs VS Aliens (2020)
  • The Illuminati Protocol (2015)
  • The Illuminati Circle (2017)

Robbins, Judith ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Judith Robbins is a graduate of Bates College and Harvard Divinity School. She grew up on Milton Street in the North End of Worcester, MA, in an area called Poets Hill. She moved to Maine in 1967 where she still lives and writes. Her first poem was published when she was seven, and she has since been widely published in magazines and journals, including The Worcester Review, Puckerbrush Review, and The American Scholar. She has also been a minister for 21 years. She lives along the Sheepscot River in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • God Poems (2008)
  • Reliquary (2008)
  • Talitha Koum: Little Girl, Get Up! (2008)
  • The North End (2016)
  • The Bookbinder's Wife and More Poems from the North End (2018)
  • To Bury or Burn: Selected Poems (2019)

Rolfe, Glenn ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Horror

Horror/mystery/thriller writer Glenn Rolfe lives in Augusta, ME. He has studied Creative Writing at Southern New Hampshire University and is a Splatterpunk Award nominee.

Selected Bibliography

  • Until Summer Comes Around (2020)

Rosenfelt, David ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Author David Rosenfelt grew up in Paterson, New Jersey and graduated from NYU. He was for many years the President of Marketing for Tri-Star Pictures. He and his wife are responsible for the Tara Foundation which rescues dogs.

Selected Bibliography

Standalone Fiction

  • Don't Tell A Soul (2008)
  • Down to the Wire (2010)
  • On Borrowed Time (2011)
  • Heart of a Killer (2012)
  • Airtight (2013)
  • Without Warning (2014)

Andy Carpenter series

  • Open and Shut (2002) Finalist for the Edgar Award and the Shamus Award for best first novel
  • First Degree (2003)
  • Bury the Lead (2004) Selection of the NBC Today Book Club.
  • Sudden Death (2005)
  • Dead Center (2006)
  • Play Dead (2007)
  • New Tricks (2009)
  • Dog Tags>cite> (2010)
  • One Dog Night (2011)
  • Leader of the Pack (2012)
  • Unleashed (2013)
  • Hounded (2014)
  • Who Let the Dog Out? (2015)
  • Outfoxed (2016)
  • The Twelve Dogs of Christmas (2017)
  • Collared (2017)
  • Rescued (2018)
  • Deck the Hounds (2018)
  • Bark of Night (2019)
  • Dachshund Through the Snow (2019)
  • Muzzled (2020)

The K Team (Andy Carpenter spinoff series).

  • The K Team (2020)

Doug Brock series

  • Blackout (2016)
  • Fade to Black (2018)
  • Black and Blue (2019)

Nonfiction

  • Dogtripping: 25 Rescues, 11 Volunteers, and 3 RVs on Our Canine Cross-Country Adventure (2013)
  • Lessons from Tara: Life Advice from the World's Most Brilliant Dog (2015)

Ross, Susan ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Susan Ross grew up in Lewiston-Auburn, Maine and divides her time between her home in Westport, Connecticut and her house on the coast of Maine. She attended Brown University and NYU School of Law, and was a 2019 Advanced Leadership Initiative Fellowship Partner at Harvard University. After practicing law, Susan taught legal writing in Brooklyn and in Budapest, and creative writing in Connecticut at Westport Writers Workshop and Writopia.

Selected Bibliography

  • Kiki and Jacques (2015)
  • Looking for Lottie (2019)

Russell, Kate (1984 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Originally from eastern Maine, Kate Elizabeth Russell earned an MFA from Indiana University and a PhD from the University of Kansas. She is a writer living in Portland, Oregon.

Selected Bibliography

  • My Dark Vanessa (2020)

Shevenell, Tonya ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Filmmaker and author Tonya Shevenell lives in Cape Elizabeth, ME but has roots in Biddeford where her great-great-great grandfather is considered to be the first French Canadian settler in the city.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Maine Birthday Book (2019)

Sloan, David ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Poet and educator David Sloan is a graduate of the University of Southern Maine's Stonecoast MFA poetry program, David Sloan teaches at Maine Coast Waldorf High School in Freeport, ME. David taught at Green Meadow Waldorf School (NY) for 25 years before joining MCWS in 2006 as a founding high school teacher. He lives in Brunswick, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Irresistible In-Between: Poems (2013)
  • A Rising and other Poems (2020)

Smith, Lyn ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Lyn Smith has worked as an educator and reading teacher for more than twenty-five years. She has lived on the Maine coast for many years. She attended the University of Rhode Island, University of Hartford and University of Southern Maine and holds a M.Ed. in Literacy and a Certificate of Advanced Study in Reading Education. She works teaching reading to young children in Kennebunk, ME. She lives in Southern Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • What Makes and Opossum Tick? (2018)
  • A Porcupine's Promenade (2016)

Stanton, Maureen ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Maureen Stanton is the author of Killer Stuff and Tons of Money: An Insider's Look at the World of Flea Markets, Antiques, and Collecting, winner of a Massachusetts Book Award in nonfiction, and Body Leaping Backward: Memoir of a Delinquent Girlhood. Her nonfiction has been widely published in literary journals and anthologies, including in Fourth Genre, Creative Nonfiction, New England Review, and Florida Review, River Teeth, and many others. Shes received an Iowa Review prize, a Pushcart Prize, the American Literary Review nonfiction award, the Thomas J. Hruska award in nonfiction from Passages North, and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, Maine Arts Commission, and the MacDowell Colony. She holds an M.F.A. from Ohio State, and is currently Associate Professor at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. She lives in Georgetown, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Killer Stuff and Tons of Money: An Insider's Look at the World of Flea Markets, Antiques, and Collecting (2011)
  • Body Leaping Backward: Memoir of a Delinquent Girlhood (2019)

Stevens, Ralph ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Ralph Stevens, known locally as "Skip," lives in Ellsworth, Maine. Stevens lived for many years on Little Cranberry Island near Bar Harbor, moving from Baltimore where he was on the faculty of Coppin State University as an English professor. The surge in online education in the early aughts allowed him to move while holding his faculty position and continuing to teach. Now retired, he devotes more time to writing. He has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and is the author of the collections At Bunker Cove (Moon Pie Press) and Things Haven't Been the Same (Finishing Line Press). His poems have appeared in The Seattle Times, Crab Creek Review, The Lyric, The Maryland Review, The Christian Century, Verse-Virtual, The Island Reader, and on the radio programs, The Writers Almanac and Poems from Here.

Selected Bibliography

  • Yesteryear (1996)
  • Things Haven't Been the Same: Poems (2020)

Thomas, Cal (1936 - )

Genre:

Author Cal Thomas lives in Daytona Beach, FL and Topsham, ME. A Maine native, he has worked in military intelligence, as a travel writer, and as a producer for PBS, the BBC, and manager of the Bangor Maine Symphony Orchestra.

Selected Bibliography

  • Decoy (2018)
  • A Stradavari Affair (2020)

Thomson, Jeffrey ( - )

Genre: Poetry

Jeffrey Thomson, Associate Professor of English (MA, English, PhD Creative Writing, University of Missouri), teaches poetry writing and contemporary literature. He is the author of four books of poems, including Birdwatching in Wartime, winner of both the 2010 Maine Book Award and the 2011 ASLE Award in Environmental Creative Writing, and Renovation. In 2012 he was named the Fulbright Distinguished Scholar in Creative Writing at the Seamus Heaney Poetry Centre at Queen's University Belfast. Recipient of a 2005 Literature Fellowship in Poetry from the National Endowment for the Arts, a 2006 Fellowship from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, and the 2008 Fellowship in the Literary Arts from the Maine Arts Commission, he is also the co-editor of From the Fishouse: An Anthology of Poems that Sing, Rhyme, Resound, Syncopate, Alliterate, and Just Plain Sound Great. He lives in Farmington.

Selected Bibliography

  • Celestial Emporium Of Benevolent Knowledge : A Sequence Of Poems (c2007)
  • Birdwatching in Wartime: Poems (2009)
  • From the Fishouse: An Anthology of Poems that Sing, Rhyme, Resound, Syncopate, Alliterate, and Just Plain Sound Great (2009)
  • Half/Life : New & Selected Poems (2019)

Tupper, Lara ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Lara Tupper is a native Mainer and author. Her short fiction was runner-up for the 2019 Nicholas Schaffner Award for Music in Literature and her work has appeared in Six-Word Memoirs on Love and Heartbreak (Harper Perennial), The Believer, Nowhere Magazine, The Ghost Story, Dogwood Journal, Epiphany, Zone 3 and other literary magazines. A graduate of Wesleyan University and the Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College (MFA Creative Writing), she taught at Rutgers University for many years and now presents writing workshops and retreats in Massachusetts. She grew up in Boothbay and lives in the Berkshires.

Selected Bibliography

  • A Thousand and One Nights (2007)
  • Off Island: A Novel (2020)

White, Arisa ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Arisa White is a Cave Canem fellow, Sarah Lawrence College alumna, an MFA graduate from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and author of the poetry chapbooks Disposition for Shininess, Post Pardon, Black Pearl, Perfect on Accident, and "Fish Walking" & Other Bedtime Stories for My Wife won the inaugural Per Diem Poetry Prize. A native New Yorker, she lives in Central Maine and teaches at Colby College.

Selected Bibliography

  • Hurrah's Nest (2012) finalist for the 2013 Wheatley Book Awards, 82nd California Book Awards, and nominated for a 44th NAACP Image Awards
  • A Penny Saved (2012)
  • Youre the Most Beautiful Thing That Happened (2016) nominated for the 29th Lambda Literary Awards
  • Biddy Mason Speaks Up (2019) with Laura Atkins

McCall, Rob (1944 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Rob McCall is a naturalist, writer and ordained minister who from 1986 until his retirement in 2014 was pastor of the First Congregational Church of Blue Hill, Maine. Rob graduated as a philosophy major in 1966 from Illinois College in Jacksonville, Illinois, and Harvard Divinity School in 1970. Before entering the ministry in 1985 he lived in Concord, Massachusetts, where his Musketaquid Almanac appeared weekly in the Concord Journal. He is a fiddler, mandolin player, singer and guitarist and has worked as an elementary school teacher, handyman, tree and landscape contractor, church sexton, chimney sweep, and the foreman of a 250 acre apple orchard. His formal education also includes graduate studies in education, Doctor of Ministry in Congregational studies, and Certification in fruit trees and entomology. Since 1992 he has authored and produced the widely popular Awanadjo Almanack, a weekly broadcast from WERU-FM to a listening audience in mid-coast Maine and the worldwide web, and appearing as a regular column in several publications.

Selected Bibliography

  • Small Misty Mountain (2006)
  • Great Speckled Bird (2012)
  • Some Glad Morning: Holding Hope in Apocalyptic Times (2020)

Winslow, W. ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

W. S. Winslow was born and raised in Maine but spent most of her working life in San Francisco and New York in corporate communications and marketing. A ninth-generation Mainer, she now spends most of the year in a small town Downeast. She holds bachelor's and masters degrees in French from the University of Maine, and an MFA from NYU. Her short fiction has appeared in Yemassee Journal and Birds Thumb.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Northern Reach (2020)

Rosenblum, Cameron ( - )

Genre: Young Adult

Author, librarian and educator Cameron Kelly Rosenblum grew up in southern Connecticut, studied English Literature at Kenyon College and earned her M.Ed. from Lesley University. She began teaching in the classroom for a while, then took the job of children's librarian. She lives in Southern Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Stepping Off Place (2020)

Brown, Gregory ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Short Stories

Gregory Brown grew up along Penobscot Bay. His short stories have appeared in Tin House, Alaska Quarterly Review, Shenandoah, Epoch, and Narrative Magazine, where he was a winner of the 30Below Prize. A graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop, he is the recipient of fellowships from the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, the Napa Valley Writers' Conference, the Sewanee Writers' Conference, and MacDowell.

He lives in Maine with his family.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Lowering Days (2021)

Merz, Jennifer ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Jennifer J. Merz is a writer/illustrator who creates intricate, handcrafted collages using the special papers, fabrics and trims of the textile world that is part of her personal and family history.

Jennifer received an MFA in Illustration from the Fashion Institute of Technology in NY. She holds a BA in Studio Art and Elementary Education, and an MA in Art Education. She enjoys giving author presentations and is a member of SCBWI, CBIG, and the Author's Guild.

Originally from Mt. Vernon, NY, the author is a longtime resident of Allendale, NJ. She divides her time between the NY-Metro area and the Maine coast.

Selected Bibliography

  • That Dancin' Dolly (2004)
  • Playground Day (2007)
  • Steadfast: Frances Perkins, Champion of Workers' Rights

Romano, Ron ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

A native of Portland, Maine, Ron Romano currently serves on two non-profit volunteer boards. He manages the walking tours program for Spirits Alive, the "Friends of Portland's Eastern Cemetery" organization, and serves as an officer on the national Association for Gravestone Studies board. A frequent lecturer on early gravestones and Maine's gravestone makers, Ron has published a series of artlcles and three books on those subjects.

Selected Bibliography

  • Early Gravestones of Southern Maine: The Genius of Bartlett Adams (2016)
  • Portland's Historic Eastern Cemetery: A Field of Ancient Graves (Landmarks) (2017)
  • Billboard Monuments of Maine: A Collection of Rare 1800s Gravestones (2020)

Leonard, Emily (1956 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Emily M. Leonard started her career as a Physical Education teacher/coach, then spent 25 years as a devoted wife and mother. She has hiked the Appalachian Trail twice, once in 2015 and again in 2017. She lives in Lowell, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • (2020)

Farrell, Ali (1986 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction

Originally from Andover, MA, Camden resident Ali Farrell is an entrpreneur and author. She graduated from Andover High School (2004). She is owner and founder of Sea Street Publishing and a photographer working for herself under Ali Farrell Photography and she founded "Maine's Working Waterfront - Seafood Connect," that connects fishermen directly to consumers.

Selected Bibliography

  • Pretty Combat: Nonsense, Shenanigans and Tactful Life Domination (2019)
  • Pretty Rugged: True Stories from Women of the Sea (2020)
  • Lobster Girl Can (2021)

Hersey, Suzanne ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature

Suzanne Buzby Hersey grew up in Califon, New Jersey. She attended the University of New Hampshire where majoring in sociology and taught at a preschool and held various other jobs working with children. She lives in Southern Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • My Maine (2011)
  • Find a Moose with Me!: A Countdown Adventure (2020)

Halsey, Ashley ( - )

Genre: Illustrator

Ashley Halsey is a designer, illustrator, and painter who moved to Portland after working as a book designer in New York City for over six years, first on cookbooks and lifestyle books at HarperCollins and then on children's books at Macmillan. She lives in Portland, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Find a Moose with Me!: A Countdown Adventure authored by Suzanne Buzby Hersey (2020)

O'Brien, Perry ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery

Perry O'Brien served in Afghanistan with the 82nd Airborne as a medic and obtained an honorable discharge as a conscientious objector. His work has appeared in the The New York Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, Huffington Post, The Nation, and the literary anthology Fire and Forget: Short Stories from the Long War. Perry has a BA in Government from Cornell University, and an MFA in Creative Writing from New York University. He lives in New York City and works as a labor organizer.

Selected Bibliography

  • Fire in the Blood: A Novel (2020)

Fisher, KD ( - )

Genre: Romance Novel

KD Fisher is a queer New Enland-based writer of authentic, heart-felt LGBTQ+ narratives. They grew up all over the United States, bouncing from North Carolina to Hawaii to Illinois and finally settling in Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Secret Ingredient (2020)

Hillard, Michael ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Dr. Hillard has taught at the University of Southern Maine for the past 33 years, and is the Director of the University of Southern Maine's new Food Studies Program. He attended the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, receiving a BA in 1980 (summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa), a Master's in Economics in 1986, and a PhD in Economics in 1988. He taught at Wellesley College and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst prior to coming to USM. He has published widely in the fields of labor relations, labor history and the political economy of labor in academic journals including Labor: Studies in Working Class History of the Americas, Labor History, Review of Radical Political Economics, Advances in Industrial and Labor Relations, Journal of Economic Issues; and Historical Studies in Industrial Relation, and is co-editor with Jonathan Goldstein of Heterodox Macroeconomics: Keynes, Marx, and Globalization (Routledge Press, 2009). His essay, "Labor at Mother Warren," won the Labor Historys Best Essay, U.S. Topic prize for 2004 and his article Capitalist Class Agency and the New Deal Order, co-authored with Richard McIntyre (University of Rhode Island) won the Review of Radical Political Economics Best Essay award for 2013. He has also written over 20 op-ed and special essays for The Boston Globe, The Portland Press Herald, Bangor Daily News, The Lewiston Sun-Journal, and The Nation. He lives in Portland, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Shredding Paper: The Rise and Fall of Maine's Mighty Paper Industry (2020)

Olmstead, Kathryn ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Kathryn Olmstead is a former Bangor Daily News columnist and editor/ publisher of Echoes magazine, based in Caribou, Maine, which she co-founded in 1988. She served 25 years on the journalism faculty of the University of Maine in Orono, the last six as associate dean in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. Her writing also has appeared in the Christian Science Monitor, USA Today, The World and I, American Journalism Review, Maine Townsman and Islandport Magazine. She also co-authored a WWII memoir Flight to Freedom: World War II Through the Eyes of a Child with Bangor portrait photographer Philomena Baker published in 2013. She was the founding director of the Maine Center for Student Journalism, based at UMaine, for high school journalists and their advisors from 1993 to 2003. Before joining the University of Maine faculty, she was a correspondent for the Bangor Daily News, editor of the Aroostook Republican weekly newspaper in Caribou, an agricultural columnist for regional and national newspapers in Vermont and Kansas, and district representative for US Senator Bill Cohen. A native of Battle Creek, Michigan, she earned a bachelor of arts in English from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, and a master of arts in English and education from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. She taught English and journalism in Wisconsin and New Hampshire before moving to Maine in 1974.
##Selected Bibliography - Flight to Freedom: World War II Through the Eyes of a Child with Bangor portrait photographer Philomena Baker (2013) - True North: Finding the Essence of Aroostook (2020)

Cocca-Leffler, Maryann ( - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Illustrator

Maryann Cocca-Leffler grew up in the Boston area and has a BFA in illustration from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design. She loves visiting schools to promote literacy and share her books with children. After spending 20 years residing in New Hampshire, Maryann now lives and works in Portland, Maine. Maryann has received many awards over the years including: The International Literary Association Teacher Pick Book for Janine and the Field Day Finish, The Florida Reading Award and the Hoosier Book Award for Mr. Tanen's Tie Trouble as well as Bank Street Best Book for Bus Route To Boston.

Selected Bibliograhy

  • Same Way Ben (2019)
  • Growing Season (2019)
  • The Belonging Tree (2020)
  • The Power of Yet (2021)

MacDonald, Richard ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Richard Wayne MacDonald is a field biologist, ornithologist, naturalist, tour guide, writer, photographer, husband, and father who lives in Bar Harbor, Maine. Rich is the owner of The Natural History Center, an organization leading educational programs and tours throughout the natural world of Acadia National Park, Downeast Maine, and beyond.

Selected Bibliography

  • Little Big Year: Chasing Acadia's Birds (2020)

Russo, Kate (1982 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Kate Russo was born and raised in Maine. She received her BA from Colby College (2004) and her MFA from Slade School of Fine Art, London, UK (2007). She lives in Portland, ME and London.

Selected Bibliography

  • Super Host: A Novel (2020)

Wahrer, Caitlin ( - )

Genre: Mystery

Caitlin Wahrer is a Maine girl through and through. She was born to two hippies who raised her in Canaan, a small town in central-southern Maine without a single stoplight in it. Regan left the state for four years to study criminal justice and marriage and family studies at a college in Pennsylvania. She returned to Maine after graduation to attend law school. She practices civil litigation in Portland.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Damage (2021)

Griffin, Nancy ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Nancy Griffin was born in Freshwater, Newfoundland before it became a province of Canada, but grew up and went all through school in Boston. She spent most of her adult working life as a newspaper reporter and editor before she began writing books. The glorious coast of Maine has been her home for more than 40 years. She lives in Thomaston, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Makin' Whoopies (2010)
  • Maine 101 : everything you wanted to know about Maine and were going to ask anyway (2013)
  • How Maine Changed the World (2017)
  • 50 Things to do in Maine Before You Die (2017)
  • Maine's Greatest Athletes (2021)

Plumb, Taryn ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Taryn Plumb is a Maine-based freelance writer who has written for a variety of publications, including daily and weekly newspapers, websites, trade and business journals, wedding, art and regional-themed magazines. She is a freelance writer based outside of Portland, Maine whose subjects have ranged from ghosts and goblins to the intricacies of finance and has always had a fascination with the paranormal.

Selected Bibliography

  • Haunted Boston: Famous Phantoms, Sinister Sites, and Lingering Legends (2016)
  • Haunted Maine Lighthouses (2018)
  • Shipwrecks and other Maritime Disasters of the Maine Coast (2021)

Gauthier, Josh (1992 - )

Genre: Drama/Theatre/Film, Horror, Romance Novel, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Short Stories

Josh Gauthier is a Maine-based fiction writer, playwright, and librarian. He was born in Vermont, received his BA from the University of Southern Maine and his MFA from the Stonecoast creative writing program at USM. He works across genres with a focus on fantasy, horror, and romance. Josh is a resident of Auburn, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Land of Outcasts (2021)

Graves, Laurie (1957 - )

Genre: Young Adult

Laurie Graves is a fifth-generation Mainer and a Franco-American. With her husband Clif Graves, Laurie Graves published the magazine Wolf Moon Journal for seven years, where she wrote essays and edited pieces that went in the journal. Her essay, "On Being Franco-American" has been read on the radio and is used in a French study class at the University of Maine at Orono. Laurie Graves has been published in the anthology Heliotrope: French Heritage Women Create and in magazines and journals. She has published three books in her Great Library Series. She also writes and narrates the pod cast Tales from the Green Door.

Selected Bibliography

Great Library Series

  • Maya and the Book of Everything (2016)
  • Library Lost (2018)
  • Out of Time (2020)

Moore, Bryce ( - )

Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy, Young Adult

Bryce Moore grew up in Pennsylvania and Utah. He has a BA in English and Linguistics from Brigham Young University (2005) and a master's in creative writing and library science. He lives in Western Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Cavern of Babel (2010)
  • Vodnk (2012)
  • The Memory Thief (2016)
  • The Perfect Place to Die (2021)

Casey, Susan ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Susan E. Casey attended Greely High School and the University of New England. Her first non-fiction book, "Rock On: Mining for Joy in the Deep River of Sibling Grief" was published in 2020. She is a writer, licensed mental health clinician, certified bereavement facilitator, and a certified life coach. Her fiction has won numerous awards, including first place in the PEN/Nob Hill Literary Contest and Green Writer's National Literary Contest.

Selected Bibliography

  • Rock On: Mining for Joy in the Deep River of Sibling Grief
  • 2010: Administration and Policy in Mental Health and Mental Health Services Research Special Issue: Developing Effective Research-Practice Partnerships for Creating a Culture of Evidence-based Decision Making
  • When It's Grief, Not Depression published on https://www.opentohope.com
  • What No One Ever Told Me About Grief published on https://www.opentohope.com
  • Open the Door, Welcome Joy published on https://www.opentohope.com
  • A Conversation With Grief published on http://thegrieftoolbox.com
  • Rock On: Mining for Joy in the Deep River of Sibling Grief (2020)

Selected Resources

Lattari, Katie ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Katie Lattari [Luh-tairy] holds degrees from the University of Maine and the University of Notre Dame. Her short fiction has been published in such places as NOO Journal, The Bend, Stolen Island, Cabildo Quarterly, Pennsylvania English, The Writing Disorder, and more. Her short story "No Protections, Only Powers" was a finalist in the Neoverse Short Story Writing Competition and later anthologized in Threads: A Neoverse Anthology. A native of Brooklyn, New York, Katie now lives in Bangor, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • American Vaudeville (2016)
  • Dark Things I Adore (2021)

Mattano, Len (1958 - )

Genre: Mystery

Len Mattano is an author and physician who was born and raised in Michigan and led a pediatric hematology/oncology program in Kalamazoo, Michigan, for 18 years. In 2009 he and his family moved to Mystic, Connecticut, where he has focused on drug development, research, and writing. He is an avid photographer and devotee of the arts, history, philosophy, and theology, all of which texture his writing. When not home, Len and his wife work from their strictly seasonal ocean side cabin in East Boothbay, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Celtic Crossing (2019)

Crabtree, R. ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

R. Christian Crabtree is a lawyer and author born and raised on the coast of Maine. After earning a bachelor's degree in history from Dickinson College in Pennsylvania and a law degree from Quinnipiac University in Connecticut, Chris spent twenty years in the corporate legal world before transitioning to life as a full-time author.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Spring House (2021)

Valente, Catherynne (1979 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Science Fiction/Fantasy

Catherynne M. Valente is the New York Times bestselling author of over two dozen works of fiction and poetry. She is the winner of the Andre Norton, Tiptree, Sturgeon, Eugie Foster Memorial, Mythopoeic, Rhysling, Lambda, Locus, and Hugo awards, as well as the Prix Imaginales. Valente has also been a finalist for the Nebula and World Fantasy Awards. She lives on an island off the coast of Maine with a small but growing menagerie of beasts, some of which are human.

Select Bibliography

  • The Labyrinth (2004)
  • The Ice Puzzle (2004)
  • Yume No Hon: The Book of Dreams (2005)
  • The Grass-Cutting Sword (2006)
  • Palimpsest,/cite> (2009)
  • Deathless (2011)
  • Radiance (2015)
  • The Glass Town Game (2017)
  • Space Opera (2018)
  • Mass Effect: Andromeda Annihilation (2018)
  • The Past Is Red (2021)
  • Comfort Me with Apples (2021)

Selected Links

Byrne, Gabriel (1950 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Gabriel Byrne was born in Walkinstown, Dublin, and he attended Ardscoil anna in Crumlin, where he later taught Spanish and history. He attended University College Dublin, where he studied archaeology and linguistics, becoming proficient in Irish. He is an award-winning actor, film director, producer and screenwriter, cultural ambassador, audiobook narrator and author. He lives in Rockport, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Pictures in My Head (1994)
  • Walking with Ghosts: a Memoir (2021)

Richardson, Heather ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Author Heather Cox Richardson is Professor of History at Boston College and a national commentator on American political history and the Republican Party. Born and raised in Maine, Richardson attended Phillips Exeter Academy in Exeter, New Hampshire. She received both her B.A. and Ph.D. from Harvard University. Her work has appeared in The Guardian, the Washington Post, the New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, Quartz among other publications and she writes the newsletter Letters from an American.

Selected Bibliography

  • West from Appomattox: The Reconstruction of America after the Civil War (2007)
  • Wounded Knee: Party Politics and the Road to an American Massacre (2010)
  • To Make Men Free: A History of the Republican Party (2014)
  • How the South Won the Civil War: Oligarchy, Democracy, and the Continuing Fight for the Soul of America (2020)

Barrows, Richard (1946(?) - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Richard "Nat" Nathaniel Whittier Barrows was raised in Connecticut, graduated from Ponfret School and the University of Denver in Colorado, majoring in History. In 1968 he became owner and editor of Island Ad-Vantages, the Stonington newspaper. He wrote the "Through My Eyes" column in that paper for 50 years.

Selected Bibliography

  • Through My Eyes: 50 Years of Maine Community Journalism (2018)

Gove, Andrew (1930 - 2020)

Genre: Non-Fiction

Andrew Gove was born in Stonington, raised on Eagle Island and lived and fished out of Stonington for over 80 years.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Life of a Maine Lobsterman: 82 Years on the Water (2020)

Schmidt, Lynne ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Poetry, Young Adult

Lynne Schmidt is the grandchild of a Holocaust survivor and is a mental health professional with a focus in trauma and healing. She is the winner of the 2020 New Women's Voices Contest and author of the chapbooks, Seyxtime (The Poetry Question), Dead Dog Poems (Finishing Line Press), Gravity (Nightingale and Sparrow Press) which was listed as one of the 17 Best Breakup Books to Read in 2020, and On Becoming a Role Model (Thirty West), which was featured on The Wardrobe's Best Dressed for PTSD Awareness Week. In 2012 she started the project, AbortionChat, which aims to lessen the stigma around abortion. She lives in Norway, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Gravity (2019)
  • Seyxtime
  • Dead Dog Poems (2020)

Bartlett, Hilary (1947 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Hilary Bartlett was born in Liverpool England and saw the Beatles at the Cavern before they were famous.. She emigrated to Maine in 1976 to work on toxic red tides and was based at at Bigelow Lab. Hilary has lived in Boothbay Harbor year-round for 45 years and became a US citizen. She left scientific research after her daughter was born to start a home-based art business. She also taught microbiology part-time at the University of Maine Augusta for many years and recently became an author. Her first book The Thistle Inn: A Wee Bit of Scotland in Maine was published by North Country Press in 2020. Her latest book Mushroom Mania will be coming out in 2022.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Thistle Inn: A Wee Bit of Scotland in Maine (2020)

Button, Alan (1951 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Mystery, Young Adult

Author Alan G. Button has a Bachelor's degree in Environmental Science, and his extensive research includes the fields of archeology, shell-midden research, wildlife behavior, ancient cultures and beliefs, Native American spirituality and mysticism, and mythology. He is the writer of four feature and three short screenplays, two novels, a book of short-stories, and several articles reflecting his own research in prehistoric archaeology.

Selected Bibliography

The White Owl Mysteries

  • Dance of the Firewalker (White Owl Mysteries no. 1) (2021)
  • Garden of the Soultaker (White Owl Mysteries no. 2) (2021)

Bouwsma, Julia (1980 - )

Genre: Poetry

Julia Bouwsma is the sixth Poet Laureate of Maine (2021-2026) and author of two poetry collections. She serves as the Library Director for Webster Library in Kingfield, Maine and teaches in the Creative Writing department at the University of Maine at Farmington. She grew up in New Haven, CT, studied English at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania and received an MFA in creative writing from Goddard College in Vermont.

Selected Bibliography

  • Midden (2018)
  • Work by Bloodlight (2017)

Stevens, Bette (1947 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Poetry, Short Stories, Young Adult

Award-winning author Bette A. Stevens was born in Suffren, NY, received her BS in Education from the University of Maine (Orono) (1997) and did her Graduate Studies in Curriculum Development at Chapman University in California. She is a retired elementary and middle school teacher who lives in Hartland, ME. She advocates for children and families, for childhood literacy and for the conservation of monarch butterflies. Stevens has written articles for Echoes, The Northern Maine Journal of Rural Culture.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Tangram Zoo and Word Puzzles Too!
  • Amazing Matilda 2013 Purple dragonfly Book Award and Gittle List
  • Pure Trash
  • Dog Bone Soup 2017 KCT International Literary Award Top Finalist
  • My Maine, Haiku through the Seasons (2019)

Carpenter, William (1940 - )

Genre: General Fiction, Poetry

Born in Cambridge, MA and raised in Waterville, ME, William Carpenter earned a B.A. from Dartmouth and a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota. He began publishing poetry in 1976, and won the Associated Writing Program's Contemporary Poetry Award in 1980. In 1985 he received the Samuel French Morse Prize and a National Endowment for the Arts grant. In 1972 he helped found the College of the Atlantic, serving on the faculty for 48 years.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Hours of Morning, Poems 1976-1979 (1981)
  • Rain,/cite> (1985)
  • Speaking Fire at Stones (1992)
  • A Keeper of Sheep (1996)
  • The Wooden Nickel (2002)
  • Silence (2021)

Shepherd, Deborah ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Deborah K. Shepherd was born in Cambridge, MA and spent much of her early life in the New York area. She worked as a reporter for Show Business in NYC and The Roe Jan Independent in Columbia County, NY, freelanced as a travel writher, and was a social worker. She graduated from the Interlochen Arts Academy in Interlochen, Michigan, holds a BFA in drama from the University of Arizona and an MSW from the Fordham University Graduate School of Social Service. Deborah lives in Belfast, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • So Happy Together (2021)

Packard, Christopher ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Writer Christopher Packard was born and raised in Ohio and summered in Maine as a child. He has degrees in Biology and Education and teaches high school science. He has also worked in park and ecosystem restoration in Northwest Ohio and was a naturalist fellow and instructor at Eagle Bluff Environmental in Minnesota. He moved to Maine in 2007 and lives in Hampden.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mythical Creatures of Maine (2021)

Cotton, Timothy ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Tim Cotton is a detective lieutenant with the Bangor Police Department and commander of their Criminal Investigations Division. A recipient of the Erma Bombeck Award for humor, his writing has been published in a number of newspapers, magazines, and websites, most recently CarTalk.com and the Bangor Daily News. The uniform company Blauer also posts a regular podcast, narrated by Cotton. He lives in Bangor, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Detective in the Dooryard; Reflections of a Maine Cop (2020)
  • Got Warrants?: Dispatches from the Dooryard (2021)

Lagerbom, Charles ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Charles H. Lagerbom received his BA in History from Kansas State University and MA in History and Archaeology from University of Maine. He worked in Antarctica with glacial geology research teams from University of Maine Quaternary Institute, now Climate Change Institute. A published author and avid polar, colonial Maine and maritime book collector, Charles has frequently written, lectured and made presentations on cruise ships, sailing vessels and ashore about the history, life, politics and science of the Antarctic and South Atlantic as well as colonial Maine and New England maritime history. Charles is past Membership Chair of the American Polar Society and past President of the Antarctican Society, where he is its current archivist/historian. He teaches AP US History and co-teaches a Marine Studies class at Belfast Area High School. Charles 'Chip' Lagerbom makes his home in Northport, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Fifth Man: The Life of H.R. Bowers (1999) -
  • Whaling in Maine (2020)
  • Maine to Cape Horn: The World's Most Dangerous Voyage (2021)

Mann, John ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

John T. Mann is a surveyor, historian, author, and descendant of a family that has lived in Freeport, ME for three hundred years. He attended Freeport' Grove Street School, and then Freeport High School. He studied surveying at Central Maine Vocational Technical Institute and is a professionally licensed surveyor. He lives in Bowdoin, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Ulster-Scots on the Coast of Maine (2006)
  • Sideshots : Stories from a Land Surveyor's Traverse through the District of Maine (2021)

Nadeau, Phil (1955 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Phil Nadeau, a Lewiston native, became assistant city administrator in 1999 after working as town manager in Richmond. He received his BS in Public Administration from UMA in 1994, and his MA in Public Policy and Management from USM in 2005. He splits his time between Maine and Florida.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Unlikeliness of It All, Part 1: An Insider's Perspective: A Small Maine Town's History of Resilience, Transformation, Collaboration, Immigration and its Global Singularity (2021)

Little, Carl (1954 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly, Poetry

Carl Little is an art critic, poet, the author of many art books, and lectures widely. He contributes to a number of publications, including Art New England, Maine Boats, Homes & Harbors, Ornament, Maine Home & Design, and Island Journal.

Little's poetry has appeared in a wide range of literary journals, including the Paris Review, Off the Coast, Hudson Review and Words & Images. A native New Yorker, Little holds degrees from Dartmouth (BA, English), Middlebury (MA, French) and Columbia (MFA, writing).

Prior to joining the staff at the Maine Community Foundation in 2001 as Director of Communications and Marketing, he directed the public affairs office at College of the Atlantic and oversaw the Ethel Blum Gallery. Little lives and writes in Somesville on Mount Desert Island.

Selected Bibliography

  • Edward Hoppers New England (1993)
  • The Watercolors of John Singer Sargent (1998)
  • Ocean Drinker: New & Selected Poems (2006)
  • The Art of Francis Hamabe (2012)
  • Eric Hopkins: Above and Beyond (2011) winner of the first John N. Cole Award from Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance
  • Nature & Culture: The Art of Joel Babb (2013)

Smith, Mac ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Mac Smith is a Navy veteran of the first Gulf War and former reporter for The Bar Harbor Times. He lives in Stockton Springs in the village of Sandy Point and serves as Town Manager for Stockton Springs.

Selected Bibliography

  • Mainers on the Titanic (2014)
  • Peyton Place Comes Home to Maine (2020)
  • Maine's Hail to the Chief: A History of Presidential Visits to the Pine Tree State (2021)

Moore, Leslie ( - )

Genre: Illustrator, Poetry

Leslie Moore earned a BA and an MA in English from the University of California at Berkeley and taught English for 25 years in the Republic of Korea, Massachusetts, Mali, Turkey, and Maine. She finished her teaching career at Maine Maritime Academy in 2006. She was the staff artist for The Brooksville Breeze, a newsletter for the town of Brooksville, Maine, for 8 years.

Selected Bibliograpy

Illustrator

  • Sailing Language by E.D. Smith and T.R. Moore (2000)
  • All My Dogs: A Life by Bill Henderson (2011)
  • Saving Nails by Thomas R. Moore (2016).

Cover Illustrator

  • Sage Advice from Uncle Oscar by Sage Collins (2015)
  • Add Water, Add Fire by Karie Friedman (2017)

Poet/Illustrator

  • What Rough Beasts: Poetry/Prints (2021)

Troisi, Gina ( - )

Genre: General Fiction, Non-Fiction, Short Stories

Gina received an MFA in creative nonfiction from The University of Maine's Stonecoast MFA Program in 2009. She was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2020. Her stories and essays have appeared in numerous literary journals and anthologies, including Fourth Genre, The Gettysburg Review, Fugue, Under the Sun, Flyway: Journal of Writing and Environment, and elsewhere. Her pieces have been recognized as finalists in several contests, including the 2020 Iron Horse Literary Review Trifecta Award in Fiction, the 2018 New Letters Publication Award in Fiction, the 2012 Iowa Review Award in Creative Nonfiction, the 2012 Bellevue Literary Review Nonfiction Prize, Bellingham Reviews 2012 Annie Dillard Award for Creative Nonfiction, and the 2009 Eric Hoffer Award for prose. She received an Honorable Mention for American Literary Reviews Creative Nonfiction Contest, 2018, and for Gulf Coasts 2012 Nonfiction Prize. She was selected as Writer-in-Residence 2012 at Randolph College in Lynchburg, Virginia. Gina teaches writing at Southern New Hampshire University.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Angle of Flickering Light (2021)

Lipfert, Nathan ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction, Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Nathan Lipfert is curator emeritus of the Maine Maritime Museum in Bath, Maine. A nautical and maritime historian, he has written extensively on the subject. He lives in Woolwich, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Guide to Log Books and Sea Journals 1764-1938 in the Collections of the Maine Maritime Museum (1995)
  • Lobstering and the Maine Coast with Kenneth R. Martin (1985)
  • Two Centuries of Maine Shipbuilding: A Visual History (2021)

Spencer, Randy ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Randy Spencer was and ad-man and jingle writer for 20 years. For the past 20 years, Randy has been a full-time professional fishing guide in the Grand Lake Stream, Maine region. In the off-season, he lives in Holden, Maine.

Selected Bibliography

  • Where Cool Waters Flow, Four Seasons with a Master Maine Guide(/cite> winner, New England Outdoor Writers Associaton Best Book of 2010
  • Wide and Deep: Tales and Recollections from a Master Maine Fishing Guide (2014) winner New England Outdoor Writers Associaton Best Book of 2015, and national first prize from the Outdoor Writers of America for Best Book for General Audiences, 2015
  • Written on the Water: Characters and Mysteries from Maine's Back of Beyond (2021)

Stephens, Spencer ( - )

Genre: General Fiction

Spencer Stephens was an English major at East Carolina University and earned his way through college as an American Sign Language interpreter. He earned a law degree from the Catholic University of America.

After college, Spencer went to work as a news and features writer for daily newspapers, including The Capital-Gazette in Annapolis and The Evening Telegram in Rocky Mount, NC. His freelance work has appeared in The Washington Post, The Washington Times and The Portland Press-Herald.

Selected Bibliography

  • Blood Lily (2021)

Fitz, Michael ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Author Michael Fitz is a former National Park Service ranger, an expert in the natural history and ecology of Brooks River, particularly the river's brown bears, and works as the resident naturalist for explore.org. He lives in northern Maine.

Select Bibliography

  • The Bears of Brooks Falls: Wildlife and Survival on Alaska's Brooks River (2021)

Wilde, Dana ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Educcator, author and naturalist Dana Wilde lives in Troy, ME. He attended the University of Southern Maine (BA, English), State University of New York at Binhamton (MA, PhD, English). He has worked as a professor, a journalist, copy editor, columnist and is a self-described backwoods philosopher.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Other End of the Driveway (2011)
  • Summer to Fall: Notes and Numina from the Maine Woods (2016)
  • A Backyard Book of Spiders in Maine (2020)
  • Winter: Notes and Numina from the Maine Woods (2021)

Fuller, Robert ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction - Scholarly

Portland resident Robert P. Fuller worked in railroads for 32 years beginning with the Boston and Maine Corporation. He attended the University of Maine (Portland) receiving his BS and his MS in Education.

Selected Bibliography

  • New England Railroads, Past, Present and Future (1977)
  • Last Shots for Patton's Third Army (2003)
  • New England Railroaders in World War I (2021)

MacIsaac, Kimberly ( - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Kimberley Erico MacIsaac is a fourth generation Peaks Islander who has researched, written and lectured about Peaks Island history for over thirty years. She has written and edited newsletters and booklets for museums and historical societies, coordinated the Maine Civil War Trail created for the Sesquicentennial of the Civil War in 2013 and now divides her time between serving on three nonprofit boards and operating her seasonal tour business.

Selected Bibliography

  • The Casco Bay Islands 1850-2000 (2000)
  • Peaks Island, Past and Present (2021)

Herbert, W. ( - )

Genre: Poetry

W. J. Herbert's work was awarded the Anna Davidson Prize and was selected by Natasha Trethewey for inclusion in Best American Poetry 2017. Her poetry, fiction and reviews have appeared in Alaska Quarterly Review, the Antioch Review, Boulevard, New Ohio Review, Pleiades, Southwest Review and elsewhere. She was born in Cleveland, OH and raised in Southern California, where she earned a bachelor's in studio art and a master's in flute performance. She lives in Kingston, NY and Portland, ME.

Selected Bibliography

  • Dear Specimen: Poems (2021)

Reimer, Donald (1947 - )

Genre: Non-Fiction

Don Reimer is a lifelong birder and photographer residing in Warren, Maine. A board member of the Midcoast Audubon Society, he has led field excursions for local environmental organizations and the American Birding Association National Convention. He is a board member of the Friends of Maine Coastal Islands National Wildlife Refuge in Rockland, Maine.

Don has participated in multiple citizen science projects, including Project Feeder Watch, the Atlas of Breeding Birds in Maine (1978-83), the Maine Owl Survey, and the International Shorebird Survey. He has served as compiler for the ThomastonRockland and PemaquidDamariscotta Christmas Bird Counts. Currently he serves as a regional coordinator for the 201822 Maine Bird Atlas project. His bi-monthly column Birding with Don Reimer has appeared in the Rockland Free Press since 2007.

Seen Anything Good? is about everyday people and the birds that inhabit and share the natural environment with them. From novice bird watcher to the most seasoned field guide, the basic study of birds delivers rich sources of personal and scientific knowledge, inspiration, and entertaining fascination. The real majesty of birds is their power to lead us on journeys of discovery across the globe or even much closer to home. Seen Anything Good? is a personal invitation to start your own journey of natural discovery today.

Schriever, Edith (1972 - )

Genre: Children's Literature, Poetry, Young Adult

Edith was born and raised in the Netherlands and moved to Bar Harbor, Maine in 2001. She wrote a blog for the Bangor Daily News, Double Dutch plus Three and released her first Free verse novel in 2021, Talos and the Yellow Suitcase, published by Maine Authors Publishing.

Hotchkiss, Kate (1961 - )

Genre: General Fiction

Kate Hotchkiss is a writer, model, and photographer with contributions to magazines, newspapers, commercial productions, and books. Prior to authoring On Harbor's Edge, Kate enjoyed decades of business with Asia via the United Nations, private sector, and government service. She lives on Maine islands year round.

On Harbor's Edge, Book One: 1912 - 1913, published 2020

www.katehotchkiss.com