Brian Doyle
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"A compelling, marvelous novel by the acclaimed author of Mink River Declan O Donnell has left Oregon aboard his boat, the Plover, to escape the life that's so troubled him on land. He sets course west into the Pacific in search of solitude. Instead, he finds a crew, each in search of something themselves, and what at first seems a lonely sea voyage becomes a rapturous, heartfelt celebration of life's surprising paths, planned and unplanned"--
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In a small fictional town on the Oregon coast there are love affairs and almost-love-affairs, mystery and hilarity, bears and tears, brawls and boats, a garrulous logger and a silent doctor, rain and pain, Irish immigrants and Salish stories, mud and laughter. An expedition is mounted, a crime committed, and there's an unbelievably huge picnic on the football field. Babies are born. A car is cut in half with a saw. A river confesses what its thinking....
3) Easy Avenue
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In his first year in high school, Hubbo O'Driscoll is torn between his poor but fun friends and the shallow but rich kids. In this novel based on Great Expectations, Brian Doyle does a brilliant job of dealing with the issue of class and all its implications. Poverty, social climbing and the connotations of each are presented through the classic Doyle blend of humor and gravity.
4) Uncle Ronald
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In 1895, to escape his violent father, Mickey is sent to stay with his Uncle Ronald and his twin aunts in the hills north of Ottawa and learns to feel safe for the first time in his life.
5) Pure Spring
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It's spring in post-World War II Ottawa and Matin has found a true home. He's also working even though he had to lie about his age to get the job. Martin is also in love, but his boss is robbing the family of the one he loves.
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Spud gets angry when he sees Dumper Stubbs, a creepy delivery man, dumping oil into a storm drain and causing terrible pollution in the river. When Spud blows the whistle, he loses his job. Enlisting the help of his buddy, Dink the Thinker, and Connie Pan, Spud thinks he has a chance of regaining his job . . . and stopping the Dumper's harmful activities.
7) Angel Square
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A nameless barman tends a decaying bar in Hollywood and takes notes for a book about his clientele. Initially, he is morbidly amused by watching the regulars roll in and fall into their nightly oblivion, pitying them and their loneliness. In hopes of uncovering their secrets and motives, he establishes tentative friendships with them. He also knocks back pills indiscriminately and treats himself to gallons of Jameson's. But as his tenure at the bar...
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Boy O'Boy Martin O'Boy's life is not easy. His beloved Granny has just died, his pregnant mother and father fight all the time and his twin, Phil, is completely incapacitated. Martin is the one his mother counts on.Angel SquareYoung Tommy is seeing Angel Square through new eyes since his best friend's father was beaten up just because he's Jewish. Brian Doyle brings his award-winning blend of humor and wisdom to bear in this mystery that confronts...
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Spud SweetgrassSpud gets angry when he sees Dumper Stubbs, a creepy delivery man, dumping oil into a storm drain and causing terrible pollution in the river. When Spud blows the whistle, he loses his job. Enlisting the help of his buddy, Dink the Thinker, and Connie Pan, Spud thinks he has a chance of regaining his job... and stopping the Dumper's harmful activities.Spud in WinterSpud Sweetgrass and his friends Connie Pan and Dink the Thinker are...
10) Spud In Winter
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Spud Sweetgrass and his friends Connie Pan and Dink the Thinker are back. And this time Spud is in some frigid trouble. One morning Spud sees a terrible crime. And he can't get it out of his mind. Detective Kennedy wants him to tell her what he saw, but he's afraid of the man with the most beautiful hair in the world -- afraid for himself, and afraid for Connie Pan. How will Spud find his way our of the mess he's in? Another masterful book by award-winning...
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Brian Doyle himself explains it best: "A few years ago I was moaning to my wry gentle dad that basketball, which seems to me inarguably the most graceful and generous and swift and fluid and ferociously-competitive-without-being-sociopathic of sports, has not produced rafts of good books, like baseball and golf and cricket and surfing have . . . Where are the great basketball novels to rival The Natural and the glorious Mark Harris baseball quartet...
12) Boy O'Boy
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Martin O'Boy's life is not easy. His beloved Granny has just died, his pregnant mother and father fight all the time and his twin, Phil, is completely incapacitated. Martin is the one his mother counts on. But life in Ottawa's Lowertown is not all bad. He has his best friend, Billy Batson (a.k.a. Captain Marvel), the movies, his cat Cheap and there's the glamorous Buz from next door, who is off at the war. As the war comes to an end with the bombing...
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If you love to read, or write, or both, you'll appreciate Brain Doyle-passionate observer of and commentator on all things written. In this ultimate collection of his thoughts on writers and writing and readers and reading, he covered everything from what the books people keep stashed in the cars or sitting on their bookshelves tell you about them, to the pleasures of reading box scores or what's hung on refrigerator doors, to the scent that books...
14) Up to Low
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Young Tommy and Baby Bridget, the girl with the trillium-shaped eyes, discover that living, healing and dying are not always what they seem. And they make that discovery with the help of a wonderful cast of characters, including Crazy Mickey, Frank and the Hummer. Award-winning author Brian Doyle spent the summers of his boyhood in the Gatineau Hills, the setting for Up to Low.
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Prose poems, chants, litanies, simple songs, cadenced prayers, brief bursts of rhythmic observation, elegies to little moments that are not little at all in the least whatsoever; welcome to the melodic world of Brian Doyle's 'proems,' swirling with voices unreeling tales, souls telling stories, moments photographed with ink. Accessible, easy to read, blunt, brief, and sometimes unforgettable, 'these are not poems,' says the author, 'but life set to...
16) Hey Dad!
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A family car trip across Canada brings Megan and her dad face to face with how sad and happy growing up can be.
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Proems, taut tales, small stories with rhythm and blues and grace and bruise and laughter between the lines. Brian Doyle's The Kind of Brave You Wanted to Be is a book of cadenced notes on the swirl of miracle and the holy of attentiveness; a book about children and birds, love and grief and everything alive, which is to say all prayers. Brian Doyle's uncategorizable form is the brief story dressed like a poem but with the loose lyricism and verve...
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Up to LowYoung Tommy and Baby Bridget, the girl with the trillium-shaped eyes, discover that living, healing and dying are not always what they seem. And they make that discovery with the help of a wonderful cast of characters, including Crazy Mickey, Frank and the Hummer. Uncle RonaldOld Mickey is one hundred and twelve years old. He can't remember what he ate for lunch today, but he can remember every detail of what happened one hundred years ago,...
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Is Brian Doyle the most passionate Catholic storyteller in America? Here is new evidence that he is. In this brand new compilation of some of his best stories that have appeared in various publications throughout the world, Doyle explores the promise of Catholicism in America that he has experienced and observed from his childhood through today.
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When Ryan's dad runs away from home because of the change of life, Ryan is sent to spend the summer with his aunt in Peggy's Cove. He goes fishing, almost gets into big trouble and learns a lot about tourist behavior, but most of all he misses his dad and hopes he'll come back soon.