"Non Fiction Fans!! 
A monthly non fiction book club will meet at PPB 261 on the first Thursdays of the month.  

Ann and Steph will lead discussions on a variety of reads within the genre, including history, biography, current events, memoirs and science and nature. We are excited to offer this new series.

Free! Call the store to say you can come, (630) 765-7455.

“Disturbing and riveting. . . . Grann has proved himself a master of spinning delicious, many-layered mysteries that also happen to be true. . . . It will sear your soul.”

—Dave Eggers, New York Times Book Review

In the 1920s, the richest people per capita in the world were members of the Osage Nation in Oklahoma. After oil was discovered beneath their land, the Osage rode in chauffeured automobiles, built mansions, and sent their children to study in Europe.

Then, one by one, the Osage began to be killed off. The family of an Osage woman, Mollie Burkhart, became a prime target. One of her relatives was shot. Another was poisoned. And it was just the beginning, as more and more Osage were dying under mysterious circumstances, and many of those who dared to investigate the killings were themselves murdered.

As the death toll rose, the newly created FBI took up the case, and the young director, J. Edgar Hoover, turned to a former Texas Ranger named Tom White to try to unravel the mystery. White put together an undercover team, including a Native American agent who infiltrated the region, and together with the Osage began to expose one of the most chilling conspiracies in American history.

"Non Fiction Fans!! 
A new monthly non fiction book club will meet at PPB 261 on the first Thursdays of the month.  

Ann and Steph will lead discussions on a variety of reads within the genre, including history, biography, current events, memoirs and science and nature. We are excited to offer this new series.

Free! Call the store to say you can come, (630) 765-7455.

A major biography of John F. Kennedy Jr. from a leading historian who was also a close friend, America's Reluctant Prince is a deeply researched, personal, surprising, and revealing portrait of the Kennedy heir the world lost too soon. Through the lens of their decades-long friendship and including exclusive interviews and details from previously classified documents, noted historian and New York Times bestselling author Steven M. Gillon examines John F. Kennedy Jr.'s life and legacy from before his birth to the day he died. Gillon covers the highs, the lows, and the surprising incidents, viewpoints, and relationships that John never discussed publicly, revealing the full story behind JFK Jr.'s complicated and rich life. In the end, Gillon proves that John's life was far more than another tragedy—rather, it's the true key to understanding both the Kennedy legacy and how America's First Family continues to shape the world we live in today.

A monthly nonfiction bookclub meets at PPB 261 on the first Thursdays of the month.  

Ann and Steph will lead discussions on a variety of reads within the genre, including history, biography, current events, memoirs and science and nature. We are excited to offer this new series.

Free! Call the store to say you can come, (630) 765-7455.

This is the life of Abigail Adams, wife of patriot John Adams, who became the most influential woman in Revolutionary America. Rich with excerpts from her personal letters, Dearest Friend captures the public and private sides of this fascinating woman, who was both an advocate of slave emancipation and a burgeoning feminist, urging her husband to “Remember the Ladies” as he framed the laws of their new country.

John and Abigail Adams married for love. While John traveled in America and abroad to help forge a new nation, Abigail remained at home, raising four children, managing their estate, and writing letters to her beloved husband. Chronicling their remarkable fifty-four-year marriage, her blossoming feminism, her battles with loneliness, and her friendships with Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, Dearest Friend paints a portrait of Abigail Adams as an intelligent, resourceful, and outspoken woman.

A new monthly nonfiction book club will meet at PPB 261 on the first Thursdays of the month.  

Ann and Steph will lead discussions on a variety of reads within the genre, including history, biography, current events, memoirs and science and nature. We are excited to offer this new series.

Free! Call the store to say you can come, (630) 765-7455.

The Great Chicago Fire and The Peshtigo Fire and The Great Chicago Fire of 1871:  The Story of the Blaze that Destroyed the Midwest's Largest City by Charles River Editors

The Deadly Night of October 8, 1871 chronicles the story of two of America’s deadliest fires. Along with pictures of important people, places, and events, you will learn about the Great Chicago Fire and the Peshtigo fire like never before, in no time at all. 

It had taken about 40 years for Chicago to grow from a small settlement of about 300 people into a thriving metropolis with a population of 300,000, but in just two days in 1871, much of that progress was burned to the ground. In arguably the most famous fire in American history, a blaze in the southwestern section of Chicago began to burn out of control on the night of October 8, 1871. Thanks to The Chicago Tribune, the fire has been apocryphally credited to a cow kicking over a lantern in Mrs. Catherine O’Leary’s barn, and though that was not true, the rumor dogged Mrs. O’Leary to the grave.

These two books chronicle one of the largest natural disasters of the 19th century in America. Along with pictures of important people, places, and events, you will learn about the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 like never before, in no time at all.

Non Fiction Fans!! 
A new monthly non fiction book club will meet at PPB 261 on the first Thursdays of the month.  

Ann and Steph will lead discussions on a variety of reads within the genre, including history, biography, current events, memoirs and science and nature. We are excited to offer this new series.

Free! Call the store to say you can come, (630) 765-7455.

From Alexander von Humboldt to Charles and Anne Lindbergh, these are stories of people of great vision and daring whose achievements continue to inspire us today, brilliantly told by master historian David McCullough.

The bestselling author of Truman and John Adams, David McCullough has written profiles of exceptional men and women past and present who have not only shaped the course of history or changed how we see the world but whose stories express much that is timeless about the human condition.

Here are Alexander von Humboldt, whose epic explorations of South America surpassed the Lewis and Clark expedition; Harriet Beecher Stowe, “the little woman who made the big war”; Frederic Remington; the extraordinary Louis Agassiz of Harvard; Charles and Anne Lindbergh, and their fellow long-distance pilots Antoine de Saint-Exupéry and Beryl Markham; Harry Caudill, the Kentucky lawyer who awakened the nation to the tragedy of Appalachia; and David Plowden, a present-day photographer of vanishing America.

Different as they are from each other, McCullough’s subjects have in common a rare vitality and sense of purpose. These are brave companions: to each other, to David McCullough, and to the reader, for with rare storytelling ability McCullough brings us into the times they knew and their very uncommon lives.