Category: Excerpts

ExcerptsLeave a comment

Off the Shelf: The Hard Way Home by Steve Kahn

univnebpress

Hard Way Home cover image Read the beginning of "One Last Cast" from The Hard Way Home: Alaska Stories of Adventure, Friendship, and the Hunt by Steve Kahn:

"I remember gazing into a mountain stream near Turnagain Pass. Minute air bubbles formed along the backs of polished granite boulders hunched at the bottom, then rose in a swirl of motion to the surface. My little hands held tight their first fishing pole: a willow branch rigged with a piece of string from the glove box, a safety pin, and a half-ripe cranberry. I was four years old, maybe five. My folks tell me I was more interested in fishing than a potty stop.

Continue reading “Off the Shelf: The Hard Way Home by Steve Kahn”

ExcerptsLeave a comment

Off the Shelf: Cover Me by Sonya Huber

univnebpress

Cover Me cover image Read the beginning of Chapter 1, "Waiting for the Placebo Effect" from Cover Me: A Health Insurance Memoir by Sonya Huber:

"My sinuses throbbed and pressed against the bones of my face like overcooked bratwurst. I pulled open the glass door of the community co-op in Columbus, Ohio. I wanted to fill my skull with brightly colored vitamin cocaine and blot out the suicide gray midwestern sky.

Continue reading “Off the Shelf: Cover Me by Sonya Huber”

ExcerptsLeave a comment

Off the Shelf: Breaking into the Backcountry by Steve Edwards

univnebpress

Breaking into the Backcountry cover image Read the beginning of Chapter 1, "Getting There" from Breaking into the Backcountry by Steve Edwards:

"By midafternoon we’ve crossed Iowa on I-80 and started north to South Dakota on I-29. It’s the same route we took on a family vacation to the Badlands when I was fourteen, only on that trip we stopped and spent a night in Mitchell, home of the Corn Palace. Today we hit Mitchell and keep on rolling. All afternoon and into the evening the scenery is the same: the highway’s broken white center line, semitrailers streaming west in plumes of exhaust, the flatness of the plains. Checking our mileage, I’m amazed by how far we’ve come and how far we still have to go. Riddle, Oregon, where my father and I will meet the homestead’s owners at a gas station and follow them into the homestead, is 2,316 miles from my little hometown in Indiana. I can no more fathom this distance than I can fathom the distance from Earth to the moon. And though I have poured over the manual Bradley sent me and spent the last few months reading everything I can get my hands on about the Pacific Northwest, I still don’t totally know what to expect. The moon might actually be more familiar a place to me than the Rogue River canyon.

Continue reading “Off the Shelf: Breaking into the Backcountry by Steve Edwards”

ExcerptsLeave a comment

Off the Shelf: Muscogee Daughter: My Sojourn to the Miss America Pageant by Susan Supernaw

univnebpress

Muscogee Daughter cover image Read from Chapter 3, "Bozo" from Muscogee Daughter: My Sojourn to the Miss America Pageant by Susan Supernaw:

"On Saturday nights we often visited Jonesy, an old family friend who had a color TV. One night Mom saw the Lennon Sisters perform on The Lawrence Welk Show. That convinced her to make us into a family act. Mom sang soprano in the church choir and understood basic harmony and vocal arrangements. She taught Louise and Judy to sing first and second soprano parts, while Kathy and I, with lower voices, sang the alto parts. A song called “Whispering Hope” was supposed to be our big debut. Instead it was my biggest disaster. We wore blue dresses with a small lace yoke in the front. Another member of the congregation owned a beauty salon and volunteered to give matching haircuts and perms to the Supernaw Sisters. When it came time to perform, my sisters all looked great, with their matching hairstyles and dresses. Although my dress matched the others, however, my hair did not. My baby-fine, thin hair couldn’t handle the chemicals, so the same perm that looked great on them burned my hair, breaking it off and frizzing what remained, turning it a funny orangey color. Hiding my hair under a red baseball cap in embarrassment, I was aghast when Mom said, “You must take off that awful hat. We’re going to sing, you can’t wear it. You must remove it. It doesn’t matter how you look, it’s how you sing.”

Continue reading “Off the Shelf: Muscogee Daughter: My Sojourn to the Miss America Pageant by Susan Supernaw”

Awards, ExcerptsLeave a comment

A big honor, two awards, and accolades from the Washington Post

univnebpress

Today’s a big news day for the University of Nebraska Press! Let’s cut right to the chase. Sleep in Me by Jon Pineda has been selected as a Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers selection for the holiday season. Sleep in Me, which will be published in September, is Jon’s very beautiful and very moving memoir, which is part coming-of-age story, part remembrance of his big sister, Rica, who was severely disabled in a car accident when she was a teenager.  Intrigued? Read an excerpt online. And look for displays of this book and the other Discover selections this holiday … Continue reading A big honor, two awards, and accolades from the Washington Post

ExcerptsLeave a comment

Off the Shelf: Scoreboard, Baby by Ken Armstrong and Nick Perry

univnebpress

Read the beginning of Chapter 1 "Freeze", from Scoreboard, Baby: A Story of College Football, Crime, and Complicity by Ken Armstrong and Nick Perry: "March 14, 2000: Six Months before the Season Begins Kerry Sullivan tried to be careful. Sometimes, when customers would telephone, he’d turn them away. Not today, he’d say, or at least not right now. He wanted to space things out. He wanted to avoid heavy traffic. His rule was: Don’t push it. A typical house does not have people lined up out front—people who knock, enter, and leave in five minutes, one after the other. If … Continue reading Off the Shelf: Scoreboard, Baby by Ken Armstrong and Nick Perry

ExcerptsLeave a comment

Off the Shelf: Football’s Last Iron Men: 1934, Yale vs. Princeton, and One Stunning Upset by Norman L. Macht

univnebpress

 Football's Last Iron Men cover imageRead the beginning of Chapter 2, "The Rules", from Football's Last Iron Men: 1934, Yale vs. Princeton, and One Stunning Upset by Norman L. Macht:

"In order to appreciate the events and achievements described in this narrative, it is essential to understand the rules of football then in effect. Like baseball, the sport has changed little enough for someone sitting in Palmer Stadium in November 1934 to awaken after a seventy-five-year nap and still understand what was going on in the latest Super Bowl. It has also changed so much that a twenty-first-century fan, whisked back in time to that day in Princeton, would wonder why they did the things they did the way they did them.

Continue reading “Off the Shelf: Football’s Last Iron Men: 1934, Yale vs. Princeton, and One Stunning Upset by Norman L. Macht”

ExcerptsLeave a comment

Off the Shelf: Palmento: A Sicilian Wine Odyssey by Robert V. Camuto

univnebpress

Palmento cover image Read the beginning of the Introduction from Palmento: A Sicilian Wine Odyssey by Robert V. Camuto:

"I went to sicily in the winter of 2008 to explore and write about an emerging wine scene. What I discovered in more than a year of travels to the island was more than a fascinating, teeming wine frontier; I found something close to my own heartbeat.

Continue reading “Off the Shelf: Palmento: A Sicilian Wine Odyssey by Robert V. Camuto”

ExcerptsLeave a comment

Off the Shelf: Sleep in Me by Jon Pineda

univnebpress

Sleep in Me cover imageRead the beginning of "Sleep" from Sleep in Me byJon Pineda:

"A week later I would start seventh grade at Great Bridge Junior High. The building had actually been the high school building from the year before. The new one was down the road on Hanbury, the one Rica would have graduated from. As I walked the hallways of my new school, I couldn’t help but wonder which of these lockers had belonged to my sisters. I would have given anything to know. In which shadowy corner had each of them kissed their boyfriends, whispered plans to skip, or just meet up with friends after school.

Continue reading “Off the Shelf: Sleep in Me by Jon Pineda”

ExcerptsLeave a comment

Off the Shelf: Bliss and Other Short Stories by Ted Gilley

univnebpress

Bliss cover image Read the beginning of the title story, "Bliss" from Bliss and Other Short Stories by Ted Gilley:

"All my life, I seem to have been mistaken for someone else. The other day, a woman stopped me in the produce aisle at the market and said, “Michael?” When I pick up heart pills for my dad, the pharmacist always says, “Hi, Tim.” When I correct him, he smiles and says, “Good to see you.” When I walk down Idle Road from my apartment to my job, or along the highway, people I don’t know wave at me from cars. I wave back, it can’t hurt. One day a girl leaned out of a car as it shot by and yelled, “I love you, Jamie!” I am introduced to people over and over again. “Have we met?” they say. “It’s Walter, or Phil, or Daniel, isn’t it?” I have wondered if wearing a name tag would be a bad idea. Hello, I’m Cleave. Who could forget such a name? When I look in the mirror I realize that I am, to some extent, a fabrication. The face looks like mine, all right, but also looks, vaguely, like anyone’s: a racial cameo of smooth skin, fine hair. Mouth, nose, and eyes all where they should be, but somehow indistinct—the anonymous, undeclared face of a baby. A face you could put a face onto, including your own, or that of someone close to you whom you’ve not seen in you can’t remember how long. “Michael?” When the lady in the store said that, I just smiled and shook my head—and she looked confused, hurt, angry. Who had she lost? Yes, I wanted to say, but didn’t. Yes, it’s me.

Continue reading “Off the Shelf: Bliss and Other Short Stories by Ted Gilley”