He set out to make his utopian dream come true-Bronson Alcott, his wife and four daughters, and an odd assortment of friends who knew more about philosophy than they did about farming. Would their experience at Fruitlands last through the hard New England winter? Transcendentalist commune is for readers of all ages who love Alcott, history, or just a good story told with humor and sensitivity.

A memoir chronicling Shirley MacLaine's remarkable experiences filming Wild Oats in the Canary Islands and the extraordinary memories her time there brought forth of a past life on the lost continent of Atlantis

What if for just one year you let desire call the shots? The project was simple: Robin Rinaldi, a successful magazine journalist, would move into a San Francisco apartment, join a dating site, and get laid. Never mind that she already owned a beautiful flat a few blocks away, that she was forty-four, or that she was married to a man she'd been in love with for eighteen years. What followed—a year of abandon, heartbreak, and unexpected revelation—is the topic of this riveting memoir, The Wild Oats Project. Monogamous and sexually cautious her entire adult life, Rinaldi never planned on an open marriage—her priority as she approached midlife was to start a family. But when her husband insisted on a vasectomy, something snapped. If I'm not going to have children, she told herself, then I'm going to have lovers. During the week, she would live alone, seduce men (and women), attend erotic workshops, and have wall-banging sex. On the weekends, she would go home and be a wife. Her marriage provided safety and love, but she also needed passion, and she was willing to go outside her marriage to find it.At a time when the bestseller lists are topped by books about eroticism and the shifting roles of women, this brave, brutally honest memoir explores how our sexuality defines us, how it relates to maternal longing, and how we must walk the line between loving others and staying true to ourselves. Like the most searing memoirs, The Wild Oats Project challenges our sensibilities, yielding truths that we all can recognize but that few would dare write down.

Sowing Wild Oats brings, once again, an assortment of nostalgic, funny and touching stories with this, the fifth installment of the Midwest anthologies. Within these pages you'll find some familiar names, authors who have shared their memories before, as well as many new contributors. "Social Dancing Class" by David Peterson offers a humorous glimpse into the trials of a first year college student in Minnesota when he learns the class he'd signed up for isn't going to be quite as cushy as he'd thought; and in "When Memories Become a Treasure," Joyce Jenkins recalls, with love, the life of Rhonda, her special-needs daughter. Whether you're in the mood to laugh or shed a tear, there will be something here to feed the soul.