North of the Collar: 48 Hours in the Life of a Small Animal Veterinarian by Heath McNutt ( Peter E. Randall Publisher, 2026) Follow small animal veterinarian Heath McNutt as he goes about his day, jumping from neutering a Maine Coon cat to addressing a pet owner's concerns about her older Golden Retriever. No visit is routine and every page is filled with heart-warming, and sometimes heart-wrenching, moments. Get an up close and personal look behind-the-scenes at a local veterinary clinic and catch a glimpse into a veterinarian's family life. You'll feel inspired by how the McNutt family navigates their busy lives while finding time to create a full and loving home. --Publisher's blurb About the author: Heath McNutt was raised in New England and graduated from the University of Maine in Orono before attending St. George’s University School of Veterinary Medicine. He has practiced veterinary medicine in Vermont, Maine, and New Hampshire. Heath and his wife Amanda have been owners of Village Veterinary Clinic in Rollinsford, NH since 2019. Professionally, he enjoys the connection and relationships developed by managing the lifelong health care of the pets in his community. In his personal life, Heath enjoys spending time with his wife, their four children and their menagerie of pets. He also enjoys hiking, seeing new places, and reading.
They Sell Grits Here, Don't They?: A Life-long Southerner Discovers New England by William Starr (Palmetto Publishing, 2026) He gave up grits for granite. It was worth every flake. You love where you live. You know the rhythms, the food, the weather, the way people talk. Then life nudges you somewhere completely different, and suddenly everything you thought you understood about daily existence gets turned on its head. Your comfort food vanishes from grocery shelves. Your accent becomes a conversation starter at every gas station, pizza shop, and church. And that terrifying winter you always dreaded? It turns out to be nothing like you imagined. They Sell Grits Here, Don't They? is the laugh-out-loud memoir of William Starr, a lifelong Southerner born in Atlanta and rooted for decades in South Carolina, who reluctantly packed up and moved to New Hampshire to be closer to his kids and grandkids. What he found was not the frozen wasteland he feared but a gorgeous, quirky, and surprisingly welcoming world of leaf peepers, moose crossings, maple syrup, and neighbors who plow your driveway before you even ask. These sharp, warmhearted essays, originally written as a weekly humor column for the Keene Sentinel, capture the joy and bewilderment of discovering a new home later in life. Inside these pages, you will find: - A Southerner's hilarious field guide to surviving snow, pumpkin season, and the mystery of unsweetened tea - Warm reflections on family, friendship, and the people who keep life worth laughing about - Proof that home is not where you start but where you choose to stay For fans of Bill Bryson and Dave Barry, this is the book that reminds you: the best adventures begin when your comfort zone ends. --Publisher's blurb
Join William at The Toadstool Bookshop in Keene, NH on Wed., November 18, 2026 at 6 pm where he will discuss his new book.
All Manner of Evil: The Unmasking of H. H. Holmes by Avree Kelly Clark (Novanglian Press, 2026) 1894: It’s the beginning of the end for H. H. Holmes. After more than a decade committing a swath of crimes from Texas to Toronto, investigators are hot on the trail of the most daring and eccentric criminal of the age. What began as a man wanted for conspiracy to commit fraud turns into an extensive investigation that would reveal unspeakable horrors. Detective Frank Geyer of Philadelphia is assigned his most bizarre and dramatic case to date, where he’ll exhaust an entire summer searching for three missing children. All the while, in Chicago, exploration into Holmes’ World’s Fair Hotel grips a nation. The press dub it the “Murder Castle.” Witness the very real investigation and sensational trial that put a stop to the century’s most ruthless killer. A man born and bred in rural New Hampshire, who evolved into one of the most unique violators of law in American history. A handsome charmer skillfully making a place for himself among polite society while hiding an ugly secret. This is the unmasking of Henry Howard Holmes. --Publisher's blurb
About the author: Avree Kelly Clark is the award-winning author of Malice Aforethought and All Manner of Evil. Her debut novel is the recipient of the Eric Hoffer First Horizon Award for outstanding debut novel, as well as the Mystery/Crime category winner. Avree’s love of history, forensics, and research come together in writing these historical fiction accounts of very real people and events. She has begun research on her third novel about a famous historical event. When she’s not writing, she’s a freelance proofreader and copy editor who enjoys reading, trivia, long walks, healthy living, and Maine vacations. Avree is a New Hampshire native who graduated Pembroke Academy in 2005. She lives in New Hampshire with her husband of eighteen years and their cat, Aloysius. Upcoming Events: - Join Avery at the New Hampshire Historical Society in Concord, NH on Saturday, October 31, 2026 at 2 pm where she will be discussing her latest book.
- Join Avery at the Epsom Public Library on Saturday, November 14, 2026 at 11 am where she will be discussing her latest book.
Invisible Monuments: Tribute, Memory, and the Summoning of the Past by Howard Mansfield (Lyons Press, 2026) We don’t look at most of the monuments and memorials around us. They disappear from view. Think of all the mute memorials you may pass in a week that are unseen, a blurred background to your daily commute: the green-mottled great man on his horse, hosting only pigeons; the curious obelisk looking like a stunted Washington Monument; the historical marker crowded with so many words it looks like a warning label written by a cadre of liability lawyers. So much narrative left out in the weather, so much storytelling that has lost its way. Any monument that we stand before asks something of us. Think of monuments as the first part of a call and response, as in music, as in worship. We bring our sense of history to the present, otherwise the granite/marble/limestone/bronze before us will be mute. A few monuments aren’t invisible. They speak to us, like the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, and in another era, the Cenotaph in London that brought forth the strong emotional response after World War I. Each chapter explores the invisibility of monuments: The forced invisibility of the African Burial Grounds in Manhattan and Portsmouth, New Hampshire, which have been rediscovered. These graveyards were destroyed in keeping with America’s “mortuary apartheid.” The sad fate of the Irish immigrants building America’s railroads in the nineteenth century, many killed on the job to be buried in unmarked graves. A grieving family’s memorial to a son lost in World War II, built stone by stone on the family’s farm, which still draws thousands to an outdoor “Cathedral of the Pines.” A Ferris wheel, stopped forever after a tragic accident, abandoned to rust, which becomes a private monument for a five-year-old boy. A celebrated, much-pictured monument for the Battle of Bunker Hill that doesn’t have the emotional charge and significance it once held. An unusual monument, a tribute to the future—a clock being built deep in a mountain, a clock that is meant to run for 10,000 years. And lastly, a monument hiding on museum walls. The great landscape painters of the nineteenth century, sometimes called the Hudson River School, weren’t out to just paint pretty pictures. They were chasing a moment of insight when they would see this new nation clearly. Their paintings taught Americans how to see wilderness and laid the bounds for many of our national parks. The goal with these stories is similar to the landscape painters: the author refreshes our sight so we look anew at the monuments around us, and so we can engage in a call and response with our history. --Publisher's blurb About the author: Mansfield has been honored by the N.H. Humanities Council as “a gem in our granite landscape” and this fall he will receive the Sarah Josepha Hale Award. He has won a Gold Medal for Commentary for City and Regional Magazines, a silver medal from the Independent Publisher Book Awards, and was a City and Regional Magazine Feature Story Finalist. He received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from Franklin Pierce University. He has served as a writer and consultant for museums, written and performed a stage show with composer Ben Cosgrove that was the subject of an Emmy Award-winning film, and has co-written a forthcoming documentary film. He lives in New Hampshire with his wife, author Sy Montgomery. Upcoming events: - Join authors Howard Mansfield and Laura Knoy at the Harris Center for Conservation Education in Hancock, NH on Friday, November 6, 2026 at 7 pm as they discuss Mansfield’s newest book.
- Join Howard Mansfield at the Toadstool Bookshop in Peterborough, NH on Saturday, November 7, 2026 at 11 am as he discusses his newest book.
- Join Howard Mansfield at Gibson's Bookstore in Concord, NH on Tuesday, November 10, 2026 at 6:30 pm as he discusses his newest book.
"Posted by:" noreply@blogger.com (Felicia Martin)
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