Chance Ramsay, a riverboat gambler, has run into one too many sore losers; he’s just killed a man in self-defense after winning the man’s Arabian mare in a poker game in Georgia, and the man’s brother vows revenge. Ramsay flees south into Florida, encountering young Josh Carpenter and his family, who are traveling into the Florida wilderness via wagon and riverboat to start a new life. Meanwhile, outlaws are gathering around the St. Johns River near the town of Volusia with plans to take the lands and livestock they want by force. Will the Carpenters and their companions prevail over those who would destroy their dreams even before they begin to build? Even with the help of Ramsay’s blazing six-guns and the shrewd native skills of the trapper’s daughter Abby Macklin, there will be Thunder on the St. Johns before this struggle reaches its final conclusion.

Thunder on the St. Johns

Lee Gramling

Pineapple Press

A Land Remembered

A Land Remembered has been ranked #1 Best Florida Book eight times in annual polls conducted by Florida Monthly Magazine. 
In this best-selling novel, Patrick Smith tells the story of three generations of the MacIveys, a Florida family who battle the hardships of the frontier to rise from a dirt-poor Cracker life to the wealth and standing of real estate tycoons. The story opens in 1858, when Tobias MacIvey arrives in the Florida wilderness to start a new life with his wife and infant son, and ends two generations later in 1968 with Solomon MacIvey, who realizes that the land has been exploited far beyond human need. The sweeping story that emerges is a rich, rugged Florida history featuring a memorable cast of crusty, indomitable Crackers battling wild animals, rustlers, Confederate deserters, mosquitoes, starvation, hurricanes, and freezes to carve a kingdom out of the swamp. But their most formidable adversary turns out to be greed, including finally their own. Love and tenderness are here too: the hopes and passions of each new generation, friendships with the persecuted blacks and Indians, and respect for the land and its wildlife. 
A Land Remembered was winner of the Florida Historical Society's Tebeau Prize as the Most Outstanding Florida Historical Novel. Now in its 14th hardcover printing, it has been in print since 1984 and is also available in trade paperback.

Literature & Fiction

Smith, Patrick D.

United States

Florida Living Cookbook

Cookbooks, Food & Wine

Fichter, George S.

Regional & International

Seven centuries ago, Mongolia's Genghis Khan, or universal ruler, conquered half the known world. With his Mongol hordes, he vanquished more land and people than Alexander the Great, the Roman Caesars, or Napoleon, and he instilled a fear that lasted for generations. In less than ten years, Khan took control of most of Juchen-controlled China. The guiding genius of the Khan's great armies was a man known as Subotai. Genghis Khan gave him the title Orlok, the eagle, leader of armies. Subotai, the Orlok, was perhaps the greatest military commander who ever lived. Orlok follows the campaigns of Subotai from China and Korea into Persia and finally to Russia and into Europe. The mysterious Khan and the mystical Orlok arise from the fastness of the Chinese steppes and strike down empires until they stand poised at the edge of Western Europe, ready to turn it into a province of their Asian kingdom.

Orlok

Dandrea, Don

-- Full of essays dealing with Florida's history in Gene Burnett's easygoing style -- Careful research and eclectic choice of topics make history good reading that educates and entertains -- Each volume divides Florida's people and events into Achievers and Pioneers, Villains and Characters, Heroes and Heroines, War and Peace, and Calamities and Social Turbulence -- Many essays were originally published in Florida Trend -- a bit of Florida history in each issue for over 15 years -- a tribute to Burnett's appeal -- A course in Florida history and a good read too

Florida's Past: People and Events That Shaped the State, Vol. 1

History

Burnett, Gene M

Americas

Born in Minnesota in 1890 and raised and educated in Massachusetts, Marjory Stoneman Douglas came to Florida in 1915 to work for her father, who had just started a newspaper called the Herald in a small town called Miami. In this "frontier" town, she recovered from a misjudged marriage, learned to write journalism and fiction and drama, took on the fight for feminism and racial justice and conservation long before those causes became popular, and embarked on a long and uncommonly successful voyage into self-understanding. Way before women did this sort of thing, she recognized her own need for solitude and independence, and built her own little house away from town in an area called Coconut Grove. She still lives there, as she has for over 40 years, with her books and cats and causes, emerging frequently to speak, still a powerful force in ecopolitics. Marjory Stoneman Douglas begins this story of her life by admitting that "the hardest thing is to tell the truth about oneself" and ends it stating her belief that "life should be lived so vividly and so intensely that thoughts of another life, or a longer life, are not necessary." The voice that emerges in between is a voice from the past and a voice from the future, a voice of conviction and common sense with a sense of humor, a voice so many audiences have heard over the years—tough words in a genteel accent emerging from a tiny woman in a floppy hat—which has truly become the voice of the river.

Marjory Stoneman Douglas: Voice of the River

Biographies & Memoirs

Douglas, Marjory Stoneman

Arts & Literature

-- A comprehensive history of the Florida National Guard, the oldest militia tradition in America, from 1565 -- 1985 -- Covers from 1565, when Florida was ruled by Spain, through 1985, when the Guard's role changed dramatically -- Contains over 150 photographs, maps, and line drawings -- Appendices offer lists of 20th-century adjutant generals of Florida, state medals and decorations, and fatal casualties from the Civil War through Vietnam -- a great research tool -- A must for military history buffs

Florida's Army: Militia, State Troops, National Guard, 1565-1985

Hawk, Robert

Traces the lives of the dancers, Ron and Joy Holiday, and describes how they developed an act combining ballet, acrobatics, and trained animals

Cat Dancers

Holiday, Joy

Holiday, Ron

Chronological account of the social and natural history of one of America's most unique wild areas, concluding with a plea for action to prevent its destruction

The Everglades: River of Grass

Regional U.S.

Forever Island is widely recognized as the classic novel of the Everglades.Allapattah is the story of a young Seminole in despair in the white man's world.

Forever Island and Allapattah (Patrick Smith Reader)

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