Working Waterfront

Getting to know our greenery

Wildflowers of Maine Islands: The Downeast and Acadia Coasts By Glen H. Mittelhauser; University of Maine Press, 2021 Every April and May in Maine the world starts to turn color again. But differently in different geographies, we gather from Glenn Mittelhauser’s new guide, Wildflowers of Maine Islands. “There is much… SEE MORE

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Urban stories told with an urban attitude

Why I Don’t Write and Other Stories By Susan Minot; 176 pages, hardcover, $25. In American short fiction of the past 50 or 60 years, there is to my ear a certain distinct prose style that a lot of creative writing types work hard to emulate, often, or usually, or… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Eating as revenge on invasive crab

The Green Crab Cookbook By Mary Parks and Thanh Thái European green crabs are a scourge on the Maine coast, first introduced during the mid-1800s, likely by sailing vessels. They were first recorded in Casco Bay in 1900, and within 50 years had occupied the entire coast. These little crabs… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

The woman behind the ‘hidden’ food

Finding Freedom: A Cook’s Story Remaking a Life From Scratch By Erin French You’ve probably heard of Erin French. She started off in Belfast hosting “secret suppers” in her apartment, and then moved into the space downstairs which she turned into a restaurant. With the loss of that in a… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Robert Indiana’s Maine misadventures

The Isolation Artist: Scandal, Deception, and the Last Days of Robert Indiana By Bob Keyes Born Robert Earl Clark in Newcastle, Indiana, in 1928, the famed “Love” artist changed his name in 1958 not long after moving to New York City—a way to pay homage to his home state, but… SEE MORE

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The truth is out there… or not

Baseless: My Search for Secrets in the Ruins of the Freedom of Information Act By Nicholson Baker; Penguin Press, 2020 One of my many unproven cultural theories that hasn’t changed much for decades goes like this: In 1914 the world went insane. It showed no signs of recovering until the… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Doctor recounts 30 years of island practice

Go By Boat: Stories of a Maine Island Doctor By Chuck Radis (Down East Books, 2021) Dr. Chuck Radis provides a front row seat to what life is like for a practicing doctor living on Peaks Island. Although he now practices rheumatology in Portland, he and his wife have lived… SEE MORE

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Reviving Rachel Field whose muse was Cranberry Isles

The Field House: A Writer’s Life Lost and Found on an Island in Maine She Writes Press Early in The Field House: A Writer’s Life Lost and Found on an Island in Maine author Robin Clifford Wood asks, “Why has no one told her story?” The “her” is Rachel Field,… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Plenty of grit in the women who lobster

Pretty Rugged: True Stories From Women of the Sea By Ali Farrell (Sea Street Publishing, Camden; 2020) Review by Tina Cohen This is a book about women who lobster, and it is about the grit of these fishermen (the term has become gender-neutral). Nothing is prettied up here. Author Ali… SEE MORE

Working Waterfront

Carving her way from surgery to art

Carving from green wood is a whole different beast from dry-wood carving, says Danielle Rose Byrd, a Bar Harbor-based wood carver and sculptor. “It’s wet wood. It behaves differently when it dries. It wants to crack and people are super scared of that. And so I’m like … Why is that bad?” In Byrd’s new book, the self-taught carver presents step-by-step wood carving instruction, with some soul-carving instruction threaded in. SEE MORE