Bandon Public Library

"Which is more dangerous, a gun or a swimming pool? What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common? Why do drug dealers still live with their moms? How much do parents really matter? How did the legalization of abortion affect the rate of violent crime? These may not sound like typical questions for an economist to ask. But Steven D. Levitt is not a typical economist. He is a much-heralded scholar who studies the riddles of everyday life--from...

Broadcast journalist Goldberg is back with more hard-hitting observations and no-nonsense advice for saving America from the lunatics on the Left and the sellouts on the Right. He argues that while conservatives still believe in important things, the jury is out on Republicans. The 2006 election was a wake-up call, he warns, and if the wimps on the Right fail to regain their courage, recover their principles, and reclaim their sense of fiscal responsibility,...

"The Osage Orange Tree, a never-before-published story by William Stafford, is about shy, young love complicated by misunderstanding and the insecurity of adolescence, set against the backdrop of poverty brought on by the Great Depression. In the story, the narrator recalls a girl he once knew. He and Evangeline, both shy, never find the courage to speak to each other in high school. Every evening, however, Evangeline meets him at the Osage orange...

A certified classic by the master of Western fiction Zane Grey. With cattle rustling on the rise in the cattle town of Randall, Wyoming, newcomers Martha Ann Dixon and Andrew Bonning join the ranchers in their fight to protect their livestock. "Take this hombre's gun, Tenderfoot," the foreman snapped while keeping the rustler covered. Young Andy yanked the weapon out from under the man's belt. "Now tie his hands behind his back." The excitement made...

A Century of Dishonor (1884) is a work of nonfiction by Helen Hunt Jackson. Inspired by a speech given by Ponca chief Standing Bear in Boston, A Century of Dishonor attempts to reckon with the genocide and displacement of Native Americans and the passage of Indian Appropriations Act of 1871. At her own expense, Hunt Jackson sent copies of the book to every member of Congress, hoping to convince them to amend official government policies and to end...

Reports on America's "shadow" economy of illegal drugs, pornography, and illegal migrant workers, arguing that these underground industries continue to grow with government intervention.

Two distinguished psychologists look at the role of self-justification in human life, explaining how and why we create fictions that absolve us of responsibility and restore our belief in our intelligence, moral rectitude, and correctness; assess the potential repercussions of such a course of action; and reveal how it can be overcome.

Muhammad: a frank look at his influential (and violent) life and teachings. In The Truth about Muhammad, New York Times bestselling author and Islam expert Robert Spencer offers an honest and telling portrait of the founder of Islam-perhaps the first such portrait in half a century-unbounded by fear and political correctness, unflinching, and willing to face the hard facts about Muhammad's life that continue to affect our world today. From Muhammad's...

This is a new edition of Greg Louganis's 1995 #1 New York Times bestselling autobiography and Literary Guild Selection. It is the unflinchingly honest first-person account of a man breaking free of a lifetime of silence and isolation. Born to a young Samoan father and Northern European mother, and adopted at nine months, Greg began diving at age nine, and at sixteen won a silver medal at the 1976 Montreal Olympics. But despite his astonishing athletic...

A son stands trial for his mother's murder in this classic case of good and evil in a small New England town In the sleepy hamlet of Canaan, Connecticut, Barbara Gibbons stood out. She and her eighteen-year-old son, Peter Reilly, lived in a drab one-bedroom house on a desolate stretch of road. An intelligent, lively woman with a wicked sense of humor, Barbara also had dark moods and drank too much. She fought loudly with neighbors and her son, and...