Here are 100 books that Swan Light fans have personally recommended if you like
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I have always loved science and luckily had inspirational teachers at school and university. I ended up being a professor of molecular biology, but animal behavior has always fascinated me. Watching a total eclipse of the sun near my parents’ house in Cornwall when horses started to behave unusually before the darkness fell piqued my interest in writing my book. Did they know it was coming? Reading about Dolbear’s Law using crickets to measure the air temperature led me to ask what was going on. The more reading I did, the more amazing stories became revealed, and it seemed timely to put this passion into a book.
I love old technology, and lighthouses epitomize this. This book does two things. It brings to life the sheer hardship of building massive structures in what appear to be impossible places. Often, the engineers and builders had to battle the environment, and sometimes animals could help predict when catastrophe might be about to strike.
The book also tells the story of an amazing family who were instrumental in putting lights around our coasts. This saved, and still saves, thousands of lives. Reading such amazing stories as these shows the tenacity of those involved, and I think I can teach us a lot about becoming successful in the modern world, too.
An exciting new edition of Bella Bathurst's epic story of Robert Louis Stevenson's ancestors and the building of the Scottish coastal lighthouses against impossible odds.
'Whenever I smell salt water, I know that I am not far from one of the works of my ancestors,' wrote Robert Louis Stevenson in 1880. 'When the lights come out at sundown along the shores of Scotland, I am proud to think they burn more brightly for the genius of my father!'
Robert Louis Stevenson was the most famous of the Stevensons, but not by any means the most productive. The Lighthouse Stevensons, all…
I grew up near the coasts of New York and Connecticut, and since an early age I was fascinated by the natural world, especially the ocean. I have held a variety of jobs, including stints as a fisheries policy analyst at the National Marine Fisheries Service, a program manager at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and an environmental consultant stateside and in London. Throughout my career, one thing remained constant: I enjoyed writing and telling stories. I am the author of 14 non-fiction books on American history, including Black Flags, Blue Waters: The Epic History of America’s Most Notorious Pirates, and Leviathan: The History of American Whaling.
In the late eighteenth century, and throughout the nineteenth, the Stevenson family were great innovators in lighthouse design and construction. While not the first to successfully tackle the engineering challenge of building a massive stone lighthouse offshore, where it would be subject to the merciless thrashing of the ocean, the Stevensons did become the most famous and respected group of engineers doing that kind of work. Their signature lighthouses off the Scottish coast, including Bell Rock and Skerryvore, served as standards for lighthouse builders who followed in their footsteps. Bathurst’s elegantly written book is a captivating profile of this consequential family.
The epic story of how Robert Louis Stevenson's ancestors built the lighthouses of the Scottish coast against impossible odds.
`Whenever I smell salt water, I know that I am not far from one of the works of my ancestors,' wrote Robert Louis Stevenson in 1880. `When the lights come out at sundown along the shores of Scotland, I am proud to think they burn more brightly for the genius of my father!'
Robert Louis Stevenson was the most famous of the Stevensons, but not by any means the most productive. ,The Lighthouse Stevensons,, all four generations of them, built every…
I grew up near the coasts of New York and Connecticut, and since an early age I was fascinated by the natural world, especially the ocean. I have held a variety of jobs, including stints as a fisheries policy analyst at the National Marine Fisheries Service, a program manager at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and an environmental consultant stateside and in London. Throughout my career, one thing remained constant: I enjoyed writing and telling stories. I am the author of 14 non-fiction books on American history, including Black Flags, Blue Waters: The Epic History of America’s Most Notorious Pirates, and Leviathan: The History of American Whaling.
At its core, the history of America’s lighthouses is about people. Undoubtedly the most important actors are the male and female keepers, who—often with the invaluable assistance of their families—faithfully kept the lights shining and the fog signals blaring. Guardians of the Lightspresents a wonderful survey of many of the most interesting and unique lighthouse keepers through the centuries, focusing special attention on their noble actions in the service of saving others.
In a charming blend of history and human interest, this book paints a colorful portrait of the lives of a vanished breed—the lighthouse keepers—from the year 1716, when the first lighthouse was established in America, to the early 1980s when automation replaced the last human “guardian of the light." A wealth of material from the archives of the 19th and 20th centuries—primarily letters, diaries, and newspaper accounts—provides vivid stories about lighthouse keeping in this country: the daily work; coping with fog, storms and other catastrophes; legends and ghosts; women's and families' roles; lighthouse children and pets; the natural world around…
Two themes run through my book recommendations. First is the lone protagonist against impossible odds. Don’t we all feel this way from time to time in our lives? I’m no exception and still have the scars to prove it, which is why my first novel was intended to promote awareness and prevention of child abuse and domestic violence. Secondly, I’ve had an affinity for speculative fiction (science fiction, fantasy, and paranormal) since I was a child so it only stands to reason that I would be inspired by the likes of Harlan Ellison, Ray Bradbury, Philip José Farmer, Philip K. Dick, and other masters of these genres.
The variety of subjects covered in this collection of 22 short stories demonstrates Bradbury's prowess as a master craftsman and the reason why I count him among my literary heroes.
More than a few of these tales have become legendary, including “A Sound of Thunder.” Bradbury's premise of how the death of a butterfly in prehistoric times could have drastic changes in the future is a variation on the famous “butterfly effect” and a fine example of the relationship between chaos theory and the physics of time travel. For me, the most incredible story in the collection is “The Fog Horn” in which an elusive sea monster attacks a lighthouse after being attracted by its foghorn for years. This story was the inspiration for the 1953 film The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms.
Ray Bradbury is a modern cultural treasure. His disarming simplicity of style underlies a towering body of work unmatched in metaphorical power by any other American storyteller. And here, presented in a new trade edition, are thirty-two of his most famous tales--prime examples of the poignant and mysterious poetry which Bradbury uniquely uncovers in the depths of the human soul, the otherwordly portraits of outré fascination which spring from the canvas of one of the century's great men of imagination. From a lonely coastal lighthouse to a sixty-million-year-old safary, from the pouring rain of Venus to the ominous silence of…
I grew up near the coasts of New York and Connecticut, and since an early age I was fascinated by the natural world, especially the ocean. I have held a variety of jobs, including stints as a fisheries policy analyst at the National Marine Fisheries Service, a program manager at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and an environmental consultant stateside and in London. Throughout my career, one thing remained constant: I enjoyed writing and telling stories. I am the author of 14 non-fiction books on American history, including Black Flags, Blue Waters: The Epic History of America’s Most Notorious Pirates, and Leviathan: The History of American Whaling.
Although a bit dated, Holland’s book offers a wonderful and wide-ranging tour of the general and often contentious history of America’s lighthouses. It also includes profiles of many of the nation’s most noteworthy and important lighthouses, broken down by region, and presented in a way that highlights the reasons why they are so memorable. Numerous historic images enliven the text.
"A detailed, scholarly, masterly book…and yet the romance is still there." — Chicago Tribune Beacons of light along the shore have guided mariners for thousands of years — from the days when olive oil lamps burned on darkened hillsides to signal the location of ancient harbors, to modern times when automated stations sent out 350,000 candlepower beams that cut through darkness and fog. The present volume, the first full-scale study of the United States Lighthouse Service, is a celebration of these vanishing symbols of security. Written by a historian of the National Park Service, this book describes the founding and…
I grew up near the coasts of New York and Connecticut, and since an early age I was fascinated by the natural world, especially the ocean. I have held a variety of jobs, including stints as a fisheries policy analyst at the National Marine Fisheries Service, a program manager at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and an environmental consultant stateside and in London. Throughout my career, one thing remained constant: I enjoyed writing and telling stories. I am the author of 14 non-fiction books on American history, including Black Flags, Blue Waters: The Epic History of America’s Most Notorious Pirates, and Leviathan: The History of American Whaling.
Fresnel lenses, invented by Frenchman Augustin Fresnel, are the crown jewels of lighthouse illumination. They not only greatly increased the intensity of the light, as compared with earlier forms of lighting, but also became one of the most important and strikingly beautiful inventions of the nineteenth century. Levitt’s luminous prose and great skill at storytelling makes this a fascinating and compelling read. It will make you look at lighthouses and Fresnel lenses with a well-deserved measure of awe.
Augustin Fresnel (1788-1827) shocked the scientific elite with his view of the physics of light. The lens he invented was a feat of engineering that made lighthouses blaze many times brighter, further and more efficiently than they had before. As secretary of France's Lighthouse Commission, he planned and oversaw the lighting of the nation's coast. Although Fresnel died young, his brother Leonor presided over the spread of the new technology around the globe. The new lights were of strategic importance in navigation and the Fresnel legacy played an important role in geopolitical events. Levitt's scientific and historical account, rich in…
I credit my overactive imagination to a childhood in which our parents left us to run wild. There I developed a very alive and personal relationship to the living world which I've continued to both plunder and nourish in order to write novels. In these times of ecological devastation, it’s telling that so many children’s lives have migrated towards the virtual. I believe it’s the interpenetration of our own imagination into what is mysterious, enduring and alive in the natural world that shows us why we must strive to hold it sacred. I encourage all kids to get off their screens and to go outside. There you will find life’s unbridled magic.
To be truthful, I would list all the Moomin books as top of my list and am only choosing one because I can’t pick them all. In Moominvalley and its enduring characters, its seasons, snowstorms, comets, floods, and finally its absences, we find lifes’ psychological dramas, doubts, and triumphs perfectly embedded in and drawn from the tempestuous and consoling presence of the natural world. I read all these books to my daughter and relished the emergence of a conjured world that was deep and familiar, yet also distant and magical, as is whatever realm of nature you most find yourself close to. I remember Moompapa at sea for its particularly philosophical and slightly wistful tone and because who doesn’t wonder about the wildness and loneliness of life inside a lighthouse.
Soon to be MOOMINVALLEY, a MAJOR ANIMATED SERIES on SKY ONE starring Taron Egerton and Rosamund Pike!
Moominpappa is feeling at a loss. He has no idea what to do with himself - it seems everything has already been done!
So he takes his family off to start a new life in a lighthouse on a tiny, rocky island far out to sea. It's rather lonely at first, but it isn't long before the Moomins discover some funny and surprising new things about themselves.
I grew up in a house filled with books as a son of educated, well-read parents. My mother was an English/French/Spanish teacher, and my father was an encyclopedia editor. Among all the books in our downstairs, there was a custom-built coffin bookcase my father kept stocked with his favorite horror novels. He died when I was eleven and in an effort to get to know him better, I started reading the books in that coffin. I was very quickly turned into a horror fan, and a few years later started writing horror stories myself. Every time I start writing another horror story, I know I’m my father’s son.
Not a dread-inducing house this time but a lighthouse—in the middle of the woods. This book is so original in its elements—a haunted lighthouse, a sheriff in love with the woman who shot him, and a big-cat sanctuary—that it is completely awe-inspiring how Koryta is able to weave together a complex, creepy ghost narrative. Koryta (and his pseudonym, Scott Carson) is always a guaranteed purchase when a new book publishes.
Discover a brilliant thriller set in a remote big-cat sanctuary: "one of the scariest and most touching horror tales in years" (James Patterson).
In an isolated stretch of eastern Kentucky, on a hilltop known as Blade Ridge, stands a lighthouse that illuminates nothing but the surrounding woods. For years the lighthouse has been considered no more than an eccentric local landmark -- until its builder is found dead at the top of the light, and his belongings reveal a troubling local history.
For deputy sheriff Kevin Kimble, the lighthouse-keeper's death is disturbing and personal. Years ago, Kimble was shot while…
I’ve been obsessed with art since I was a kid. When I look at art, I see stories, not just about what I’m seeing, but about what it was like when the painting was created: was the artist tired, grumpy, frustrated? Why’d they paint it the way they did? Sadly, my artistic talent is limited, but fortunately, I can tell stories. After visiting William Orpen’s painting of Mona Dunn at the Beaverbrook Art Gallery, I couldn’t help wondering why he made her look so pensive. The only way I could answer that question was by writing my own story about Mona and the other paintings in the gallery!
My vocabulary for analyzing any piece of art is through storytelling; I can’t tell you how often I’ve looked at a painting and wishing I could step inside at that very moment. It’s a lot of the inspiration behind my own book. But in The Painting, Charis Cotter turns this idea on its head, leaving us wondering if stepping inside a painting would be all we think it would be. This story of suspense and fear and loss is a page-turner!
A haunting, beautiful middle-grade novel about fractured relationships, loss, ghosts, friendship and art.
Annie and her mother don't see eye to eye. When Annie finds a painting of a lonely lighthouse in their home, she is immediately drawn to it--and her mother wishes it would stay banished in the attic. To her, art has no interest, but Annie loves drawing and painting.
When Annie's mother slips into a coma following a car accident, strange things begin to happen to Annie. She finds herself falling into the painting and meeting Claire, a girl her own age living at the lighthouse. Claire's…
I grew up in a quiet farming valley in Connecticut, but I moved to a wilderness farm in the maritime provinces of Canada, surrounded by spruce forests and close to the Bay of Fundy. My favourite places are those where there is more sky, seemingly, than land; more birds than people; more wind-blown fields than houses. My favourite books take us to landscapes where people must come to terms with environments whose extreme circumstances are challenges in and of themselves.
This book inspired my own writing with its detailed rendering of 19th century life. It has all of my favourite things: lighthouses, ships, horses, buggies, wharves, and whales. “Captain Ahab was neither my first husband or my last.” How can you resist this first sentence? The novel’s massive lighthouse, and the child who has lived there all her life, inform some deep part of my world view.
From the opening line--"Captain Ahab was neither my first husband nor my last"--you will know that you are in the hands of a masterful storyteller and in the company of a fascinating woman hero. Inspired by a brief passage in Melville's Moby-Dick, where Captain Ahab speaks passionately of his young wife on Nantucket, Una Spenser's moving tale "is very much Naslund's own and can be enjoyed independently of its source." (Newsday)
The daughter of a tyrannical father, Una leaves the violent Kentucky frontier for the peace of a New England lighthouse island, where she simultaneously falls in love with two…
