Margo Datz Illustrates A Child’s Magical Night
Liz Durkee

By LIZ DURKEE

NIGHTTIDE ON A VINEYARD FARM. Lyric by Patty Schaal, Illustrations by Margot Datz. Vineyard Stories, Edgartown, 2010. $21.95, hardcover.

Sadly, I am no longer a child. Far from it. I may act like one at inappropriate times, but that’s a skill that probably hinders rather than helps write a children’s book review.

But I’ll have at it. Reviewing other people’s artistic creations is far easier than creating one’s own.

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Vineyard Bookshelf
Tom Dunlop

Bright Waters, Shining Tides: > Reflections on a Lifetime of Fishing, paintings and essays by Kib Bramhall, Vineyard Stories, Edgartown, 2011. 96 pages. Hardcover, $29.95.

I know of three painters who are also enviably good writers, all of them Vineyard men by birth or choice.

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Reading This Book Could Literally Save Your Life

Vineyard seasonal resident Dr. Mache Seibel, the author of a recent book aimed at providing simple, lifesaving information, believes that one of the most common reasons people die in a medical emergency is they don’t know when to call 911 or what to do, or not to do, after they call.

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In Full Throttle World, Breath Is Key Vehicle to Slowing Down
Holly Nadler

Breathe, Smile, Relax is the self-evident exercise that Buddhist teacher Lama Surya Das promotes in his new book, Buddha Standard Time: Awakening to the Infinite Possibilities of Now. It’s a meditation that, as he puts it, “can help us collect ourselves and reconcentrate our energy and attention. Learning how to do this prevents the cupful of golden vitality poured into us at birth from being continuously drained away.”

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Pot Luckers Envy No More, Dessert Book Has Wow Appeal
Holly Nadler

If your idea of a homemade gift of food is a paper plate of chocolate chip cookies (recipe on the package; can’t go wrong with that), bound up in cellophane and tied with a ribbon, then the new book Gourmet Gifts: 100 Delicious Recipes for Every Occasion to Make Yourself and Wrap With Style (Harvard Common Press, $19.95), is going to make you feel like the last Neanderthal when the Cro-Magnons announced, “Look, we just do everything better.”

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Awareness About Present Issues Key to Preserving Island’s Future
Peter Brannen

All around the Island this summer, at banks, at libraries, at the museum, at the Polly Hill Arboretum, at the offices of nonprofits and realtors, and at Morning Glory Farm, the pensive self-portrait of New Yorker cartoonist Jules Feiffer has been inviting us to understand the Vineyard. What the mysterious booklet asks us to understand is that the unique character, ecosystem and population of the Vineyard is under constant threat from overdevelopment, underemployment and cutbacks.

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Dog Years Don’t Lie: Canine Mortality Subject of New Book
Holly Nadler

Jon Katz, dog lover, befuddled farmer in upstate New York and author of 20 books, many of which take place on Bedlam Farm, is returning to the Vineyard to promote his latest book, Going Home. Those of us fortunate enough to see Mr. Katz on his last trip here can pass on the news that his talents as a writer are eclipsed only by his abilities before a live audience. His talk takes place on Friday, Oct. 28, at 7:30 p.m. at the Bunch of Grapes Bookstore in Vineyard Haven.

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Academy Award-Winning Writer Turns Attention to Ghostly Novel
Holly Nadler

It’s surprising there aren’t more spooky thrillers that include mysteries, and more mysteries with spooks. When equal mixtures are applied — in other words, scary stuff happening for which a reason must be found — fans of both genres put the books on the top 10 list and a classic is born: The Exorcist, Peter Straub’s Ghost Story, The Shining, even Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey, her attempt to write a hot-selling Gothic novel, a genre that runs in and out of fashion but was very much in vogue at the time. Ms.

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Mighty Morsels for Thought and Taste
Mark Alan Lovewell

Scallops:> A New England Coastal Cookbook, by Elaine Tammi and Karin A. Tammi, Pelican Publishing Co., Gretna, Louisiana, 350 pages, color photographs and illustrations, $39.95.

With fresh bay scallops being landed at Vineyard docks it is time to think about favorite recipes. Earlier this year Pelican Publishing came out with a cookbook and compendium of stories about both the coastal bay scallop and the deep sea scallop. The Vineyard is in the book, though not named often enough.

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Magazine by Artists for Artists Helps Get Creative Word Out
Jonah Lipsky

“It’s not enough to be a songbird, this world will work you to the bone,” sings musician Dan Waters on Sergeant Sparrow magazine’s new compilation CD. The latest edition of the magazine, just out with the disc included, has taken up the plight of artists working in today’s business-minded creative milieu.

Sergeant Sparrow magazine and its eponymous record label were designed to create space for artists, musicians and writers to show their work regardless whether they have been shown, signed or published professionally.

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