Boats on Land is a unique way of looking at India’s northeast and its people against a larger historical canvas—the early days of the British Raj, the World Wars, conversions to Christianity, and the missionaries. This is a world in which the everyday is infused with folklore and a deep belief in the supernatural. Here, a girl dreams of being a firebird. An artist watches souls turn into trees. A man shape-shifts into a tiger. Another is bewitched by water fairies. Political struggles and social unrest interweave with fireside tales and age-old superstitions. Boats on Land quietly captures our fragile and awkward place in the world.

In any given year, the Louisiana crawfish harvest tops 50,000 tons. The Amazing Crawfish Boat chronicles the development of an amphibious boat that transformed the Louisiana prairies into alternating fields of aquaculture and agriculture. In seeking to understand how such a machine came into being, John Laudun describes the ideas and traditions that have long been a part of the Louisiana landscape and how they converged at a particular moment in time to create a new economic opportunity for both the rice farmers who used them and the fabricators who made them. Walking fields with farmers and working in shops with fabricators, Laudun gives readers a rich portrait of the Louisiana prairies and the people who live and work on them. The Amazing Crawfish Boat seeks to unearth the complex mix of folk cultures that underlie a variety of traditions that are now seen as native to an area populated not just by Cajuns but also by Germans and other groups. Over the years, this diverse mix of cultures has produced an astonishing set of artifacts that demonstrate not only their ability to adapt, but their ability to innovate, and the crawfish boat is a great example of such creativity produced by individuals deeply embedded in their culture and place. While the lives of artists and scientists have been examined for what they tell us about innovation, The Amazing Crawfish Boat seeks to address creativity as part of a larger cultural complex of ideas and behaviors. To ascertain this inventiveness, Laudun examines the historical and cultural trends that led to this creation, drawing from archives, oral histories, and ethnographic accounts. He investigates the shops and sheds where farmers and fabricators work, revealing the immense imagination and intelligence that lie behind the bolts, welds, and hydraulic lines that hold the boats together and, in so doing, hold a way of life together.

Sailing Ten Years and 20,000 Miles In Search of Surf and Self

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, the author's family lived aboard a 47-foot sailboat, spending their summers along the U.S. East Coast and their winters in the Bahamas. As an adult, she lived aboard her own 28-foot sailboat and had several relationships trying to find someone who wasn't intimidated by her stubborn independence and free-spirited lifestyle.

What Nacky Patcher and Teedie Flinn discover in the owl light and blackberry water of Yole Lake causes them to suspect they are losing their wits. Polished wood as far as the eye can see—an entire ship comes unbuttoned! Yet they see something else, too, something far more important: a way out from the curse that has burdened the poor folks of Yole for generations. But first, they will need the villagers to do something they haven’t done in a long time: work as a team. Jeffrey Kluger, co-author of the blockbuster book-turned-film Apollo 13, delivers one of the finest, quirkiest, and most emotionally satisfying reads of the year. As they rise to the challenge of something greater than themselves, this cast of characters will capture readers’ hearts and imaginations.

Cars and trucks and bikes and trains! Rvs and construction vehicles too! Everything goes Ride along with Henry and his dad as they visit the big city and check out all the amazing vehicles around them. Full of mini-story lines, endless seek-and-find activities, and hundreds of funny details, Everything Goes: On Land is an interactive book that provides hours of fun!