Alamosa Public Library

Barbara Kingsolver and her family sweep readers along on their journey away from the industrial-food pipeline to a rural life in which they vow to buy only food raised in their own neighborhood, grow it themselves, or learn to live without it.

After their father's death, two children and their invalid mother head south to the rugged mountains of southwestern Virginia to live with their great-grandmother. They flourish until the local coal-and gas company comes around conniving to seize their property.

It's the true American story of a legendary family feud, one that spanned decades and nearly launched a war between Kentucky and West Virginia. It chronicles a clash of clans that inspired passion, vengeance, courage, sacrifice, crimes and accusations, while forever transforming the two families and the region where they lived.

"A lyrical culinary journey that explores the hidden stories of Black Appalachians through powerful essays and forty comforting recipes from the Poet Laureate of Kentucky. Years ago, when O. Henry Prize-winning writer Crystal Wilkinson was baking a jam cake, she felt her late grandmother's presence. She soon realized that she was not the only cook in her kitchen; There were an abundance of ancestors stirring, measuring, and braising with her. These...

"From award-winning novelist Idra Novey comes a "deft and surprising novel" with two unforgettable female voices. (Rumaan Alam) Set in the Allegheny Mountains of Pennsylvania, Take What You Need follows the estrangement and reconciliation of stepmother and daughter, Jean and Leah. Leah always felt her path diverged from Jean's and left her hometown without looking back, making a life for herself in the city as a young mother and academic. Now that...

Oral History, the lyrical saga of a Virginia mountain family, follows four generations of Cantrells over more than a century. With each chapter, Lee Smith, a master of regional voices, adds another branch to a family tree that sings with secrets and sadness, beauty and joy. Researching an assignment for an Oral History course, Jennifer drives to the Virginia hills where her mother and father grew up. Raised by a stepmother, the young college student...

When his cousin is killed while attending a family moonshine still, Jesse Sutherlin's investigation into the crime is hampered by his family, a girl who insists he get away before he gets killed, and the local sheriff, who arrests him for the murder.

Serving as midwives to the residents of a small mining town in prewar Appalachia, Elizabeth and her mother share in the intimate details of the lives of every family in the region, but none of their neighbors know their own secrets and desires.