Exploring Top Books of Shelfari

ROCK AND ROLL IS ABOUT TO CHANGE JOHNNY ROSS' LIFE. Living in Memphis in 1954, Johnny's world is completely segregated -- until he starts sneaking out to Beale Street at night. Beale Street, with its music clubs, is on the wrong side of the tracks, but it's the only place Johnny can hear the blues, which is all he cares about. It's also near Sun Records, where Johnny finds himself working for Sam Phillips --... (more)

Holding My Breath

by Sidura Ludwig

Spanning three decades against the backdrop of the Jewish community in the North End of Winnipeg, Manitoba, Holding My Breath is a poignant coming-of-age tale told from the point of view of Beth Levy, the youngest in a household of two generations of strong Jewish women. There's her mother, Goldie, who upholds the middle-class values and traditions at home and in the community; her aunt Carrie, who has a secret... (more)

The Year of the Bomb

by Ronald Kidd

When Paul and his friends Arnie, Crank, and Oz find out that a horror movie will be filmed in their town, they can't believe it -- they even manage to get onto the set and meet some of the extras. But then they learn that some of the actors are really undercover agents, and the four boys find themselves tangled in an investigation. Nuclear bombs, conspiracies, and pod people are only supposed to exist in horror... (more)

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

by C. Alan Bradley

In his wickedly brilliant first novel, Debut Dagger Award winner Alan Bradley introduces one of the most singular and engaging heroines in recent fiction: eleven-year-old Flavia de Luce, an aspiring chemist with a passion for poison. It is the summer of 1950—and a series of inexplicable events has struck Buckshaw, the decaying English mansion that Flavia’s family calls home. A dead bird is found on the doorstep, a... (more)

The Outsiders

by S. E. Hinton

When it was first published in 1967, The Outsiders defied convention with its immediate, deeply sympathetic portrayal of Ponyboy and his struggle to find a place for himself in a difficult world. Thirty years later, it speaks to teenagers as powerfully as ever. Even though its almost 2010 the teens in this book speak to us. The times were hard back in those days and to a 14 year old Ponyboy its hard to live. Him,... (more)

A Walk to Remember

by Nicholas Sparks

In the prologue to his latest novel, Nicholas Sparks makes the rather presumptuous pledge "first you will smile, and then you will cry," but sure enough, he delivers the goods. With his calculated ability to throw your heart around like a yo-yo (try out his earlier Message in the Bottle or The Notebook if you really want to stick it to yourself), Sparks pulls us back to the perfect innocence of a first love.In... (more)

My Life in France

by Alex Prud'homme, Julia Child

In her own words, here is the captivating story of Julia Child’s years in France, where she fell in love with French food and found ‘her true calling.’ From the moment the ship docked in Le Havre in the fall of 1948 and Julia watched the well-muscled stevedores unloading the cargo to the first perfectly soigné meal that she and her husband, Paul, savored in Rouen en route to Paris, where he was to work for the... (more)

The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid: A Memoir

The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid: A Memoir

by Bill Bryson

From one of the most beloved and bestselling authors in the English language, a vivid, nostalgic, and utterly hilarious memoir of growing up in the 1950s Bill Bryson was born in the middle of the American century—1951—in the middle of the United States—Des Moines, Iowa—in the middle of the largest generation in American history—the baby boomers. As one of the best and funniest writers alive, he is perfectly... (more)

Rabbit Angstrom : The Four Novels : Rabbit, Run, Rabbit Redux, Rabbit Is Rich, Rabbit at Rest (Everyman's Library)

Rabbit Angstrom : The Four Novels : Rabbit, Run, Rabbit Redux, Rabbit Is Rich, Rabbit at Rest (Everyman's Library)

by John Updike

Four works in one volume

Rocket Boys (aka October Sky)

by Homer H. Hickam

The true story, originally published as Rocket Boys , that inspired the Universal Pictures film. It was 1957, the year Sputnik raced across the Appalachian sky, and the small town of Coalwood, West Virginia, was slowly dying. Faced with an uncertain future, Homer Hickam nurtured a dream: to send rockets into outer space. The introspective son of the mine’s superintendent and a mother determined to get him out... (more)

You Must Remember This

by Joyce Carol Oates

Joyce Carol Oates's epic novel of an American family in the 1950's probes the tender division between the permissible and the forbidden, between ordinary life and the secret places of the heart. Set in an industrial, working-class town in upstate New York, this book chronicles the frustrating marriage of parents Lyle and Hannah; the idealistic political journey of son Warren, and the passionate, obsessive... (more)

The Scandalous Summer of Sissy LeBlanc: A Novel

The Scandalous Summer of Sissy LeBlanc: A Novel

by Loraine Despres

It's a steamy June afternoon in Louisiana, circa 1956, and Sissy LeBlanc is sitting on her front porch, wondering -- half seriously -- if she could kill herself with aspirins and Coca-Cola. She's been living in stifling old Gentry since the day she was born and trapped in a sham of a marriage to PeeWee LeBlanc since she was only seventeen. In short, she's fed up, restless, and ready for an adventure. Sissy just... (more)

Peyton Place and Return to Peyton Place (Modern Classics)

Peyton Place and Return to Peyton Place (Modern Classics)

by Grace Metalious

When Grace Metalious's debut novel about the dark underside of a small, respectable New England town was published in 1956, it quickly soared to the top of the bestseller lists. A landmark in twentieth-century American popular culture, Peyton Place spawned a successful feature film and a long-running television series-the first prime-time soap opera. Contemporary readers of Peyton Place will be... (more)

Return to Peyton Place

by Grace Metalious

In 1956 Grace Metalious published Peyton Place, the novel that unbuttoned the straitlaced New England of the popular imagination, transformed the publishing industry, topped the bestseller lists for more than a year, and made its young author one of the most talked-about people in America. In 1959 the sizzling sequel, Return to Peyton Place, picked up where Peyton Place left off: Allison MacKenzie, now the author... (more)

Icy Sparks

by Gwyn Hyman Rubio

In the tradition of To Kill a Mockingbird and The Cape Ann , a funny, sad, wise, and redeeming first novel about a young girl's battle with a troubling affliction. Rural Kentucky in the 1950s is not an easy place to grow up in, and it's especially hard for 10-year-old Icy Sparks, an orphan who lives with her grandparents. Life becomes even more difficult for Icy when the violent tics and uncontrollable cursing... (more)

Everyday Fashions of the Fifties as Pictured in Sears Catalogs (Dover Books on Fashion)

Everyday Fashions of the Fifties as Pictured in Sears Catalogs (Dover Books on Fashion)

by Joanne Olian

Comprehensive view of what middle-class Americans were wearing in the fifties. One hundred twenty pages of illustrations, accompanied by descriptive captions, depict one-piece strapless bathing suits and dresses with plunging necklines for women; business suits with wide lapels--and equally wide ties--for men; bluejeans, plaid shirts, and full, knee-length swing skirts for girls; fringed cowboy suits for... (more)

The Cambridge Introduction to Sylvia Plath

The Cambridge Introduction to Sylvia Plath

by Jo Gill

Sylvia Plath is widely recognized as one of the leading figures in twentieth-century Anglo-American literature and culture. Her work has constantly remained in print in the UK and US (and in numerous translated editions) since the appearance of her first collection in 1960. Plath's own writing has been supplemented over the decades by a wealth of critical and biographical material. The Cambridge Introduction to... (more)

Echoes

by Maeve Binchy

Wealthy David Power and huckster's daughter Clare O'Brien are divided by class in the small, gossipy Irish town of Castlebay, but the love they have for one another knows no boundaries, reuniting them after many years apart and forcing them to fight for their love once again. Reprint. NYT.

The Best of Everything

by Rona Jaffe

When Rona Jaffe’s superb page-turner was first published in 1958, it changed contemporary fiction forever. Some readers were shocked, but millions more were electrified when they saw themselves reflected in its story of five young employees of a New York publishing company. Almost sixty years later, The Best of Everything remains touchingly—and sometimes hilariously—true to the personal and professional... (more)

Shelfari Book Activity

Tags: 1950's

by Richard Peck

by Ronald Kidd

by Sidura Ludwig

by Ronald Kidd

by C. Alan Bradley

by S. E. Hinton

by Nicholas Sparks

by Alex Prud'homme, Julia Child

by Bill Bryson

by John Updike

by Homer H. Hickam

by Joyce Carol Oates

by Loraine Despres

by Grace Metalious

by Grace Metalious

by Gwyn Hyman Rubio

by Joanne Olian

by Jo Gill

by Maeve Binchy

by Rona Jaffe