Product Description: A journalist’s eyewitness account of the explosive 1849 California gold rush and his travels through Mexico. In 1849, a young, wide-eyed reporter from New York ventured West not to seek riches, but to report on the madness and exuberance of the California gold rush...read more

Stories and essays by the highly acclaimed author of Snow Mountain Passage and coauthor of Farewell to Manzanar. Taking inspiration from California s breathtaking landscapes, history, and distinctive way of life, Where Light Take Its Color from the Sea reveals a writer s keen appreciation of place. This collection of Houston s shorter work spans his forty-year career and tackles varied topics: the concept of regionalism, lessons of a master potter, the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, and various aspects of American history, including the gold rush, the Donner party, and the internment of Japanese Americans during WWII. Santa Cruz a coastal city circumscribed by a mountain range where Houston makes his home provides both a literal and figurative place from which to stand and observe. From the historic cupola of his house, he describes the timeworn candy store across the street, the touch of light on the mountains and the sea, his forebears journey to California, and other perspectives on place. A new regionalism is on the rise, according to Houston, one that is characterized by conscious choice and has a higher level of awareness about the interlocking and interdependent workings of the world. Those who are familiar with the author s novels will enjoy the eloquence of his shorter works, while others will be delighted to discover this writer, traveler, and native Californian.

The hardships, tragedy, and devastating starvation that confronted the Donner party, which became trapped by winter snows in the Sierra Nevadas before they can make their way into California, are seen through the eyes of James Frazier Reed and his eight-year-old daughter, Patty. By the author of Continental Drift. Reprint. 75,000 first printing.

In a novel that moves back and forth between modern-day San Francisco and nineteenth-century Hawaii, Sheridan Brody, host of a Bay Area radio show, sets out to rediscover a previously unknown side of his family through the journals of his great-grandmother, Nani Keala, a half-Indian, half-Hawaiian woman who became a consort and confidante to the last king of Hawaii. 30,000 first printing.

The hardships, tragedy, and devastating starvation that confronted the Donner party, which became trapped by winter snows in the Sierra Nevadas before they can make their way into California, are seen through the eyes of James Frazier Reed and his eight-year-old daughter, Patty. By the author of Continental Drift. 50,000 first printing.

Product Description: Resonating with ancient themes of quest and transformation, The Last Paradise follows Travis Doyle, a Vietnam veteran working as an insurance claims adjuster, from California to Hawaii. Doyle is dispatched to investigate fire damage to outbuildings, equipment, and vehicles at a geothermal drilling site located in volcanic lava fields believed by the local inhabitants to be the home of Pele, the fire goddess...read more

Offers essays, short stories, and poetry by winners of the James Duvan Phelan Award and the Joseph Henry Jackson Award (view table of contents)

Product Description: Previously a library book. No highlighting inside or abstract markings. Great copy.

The author describes the regions around the world's largest ocean and discovers the threads that bind the East and West as he travels through Japan, Indonesia, Micronesia, Hawaii, and California (view table of contents)

Product Description: Surfing traces the history of the sport from its beginnings in ancient Hawaii through the mid 1960s. This revised edition of the 1966 classic features extensive illustrations, a new introduction, and articles by Mark Twain and Jack London recounting their observations on surfing...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Book by Houston, James D.

Product Description: Book by Houston, James D.

Tells the story of Roy Ambrose, a nighclub piano player, and the people who frequent the piano bar in the Seacliff restaurant

With the discovery that her husband, part-time country-and-western musician Grover Doyle, is involved with another woman, thirty-two-year-old Holly Doyle escapes to New York but returns to San Francisco to salvage her marriage

Product Description: Book by Houston, James D.

Product Description: Book by James D. Houston, Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston

Product Description: A very good hardcover copy. Bumped bottom front corner. Tight binding. Clean, unmarked pages. Very good jacket in removable mylar; price-clipped; light fading and scuffing, with a bit of chipping. NOT ex-library. 224pg. Shipped Weight: Under 1 kilogram...read more