Monday Morning Mailbox!

I simply had to join this hop today, because guess what landed in my mailbox this week:

Get it through Indiebound.org, in honor of Ms. Crowe!

My sincerest thanks to Ms. Crowe over at As the Crowe Flies and Reads for scoring me an autographed copy from the marvelous Odyssey Bookshop in Massachusetts.

Publisher's Blurb:
Once again, Geraldine Brooks takes a remarkable shard of history and brings it to vivid life. In 1665, a young man from Martha's Vineyard became the first Native American to graduate from Harvard College. Upon this slender factual scaffold, Brooks has created a luminous tale of love and faith, magic and adventure.

The narrator of Caleb's Crossing is Bethia Mayfield, growing up in the tiny settlement of Great Harbor amid a small band of pioneers and Puritans. Restless and curious, she yearns after an education that is closed to her by her sex. As often as she can, she slips away to explore the island's glistening beaches and observe its native Wampanoag inhabitants. At twelve, she encounters Caleb, the young son of a chieftain, and the two forge a tentative secret friendship that draws each into the alien world of the other. Bethia's minister father tries to convert the Wampanoag, awakening the wrath of the tribe's shaman, against whose magic he must test his own beliefs. One of his projects becomes the education of Caleb, and a year later, Caleb is in Cambridge, studying Latin and Greek among the colonial elite. There, Bethia finds herself reluctantly indentured as a housekeeper and can closely observe Caleb's crossing of cultures.

Like Brooks's beloved narrator Anna in Year of Wonders, Bethia proves an emotionally irresistible guide to the wilds of Martha's Vineyard and the intimate spaces of the human heart. Evocative and utterly absorbing, Caleb's Crossing further establishes Brooks's place as one of our most acclaimed novelists.

How did I happen to win this novel by one of my favorite writers (Geraldine Brooks) about one of my favorite places (Martha's Vineyard, where I spent many summers working on my MFA)?

I lucked out.  For her 100th follower celebration, Ms. Crowe randomly selected one of us to win our choice of book, and, well, I won!

Thank you again, Ms. Crowe, and if you're reading this right now and haven't visited her blog, I do suggest you give it a try: She's a fine writer, a discerning reader, and a swell person!

Now, I'm off to see what everyone else is reading on the Mailbox Monday hop, hosted this month by Mari Reads.

MFB,
L

p.s.  I've been enjoying many blog hops this month, and just wanted to remind you about our weekend-long "Poem In Your Post" Blog Hop here from Sat. at 12:01 a.m. through Sun. at 11:59 p.m. every week.  # of hoppers varies but the quality is always top notch, so let's make this weekend a big one for poetry!