University of New England - Innovation for a Healthier Planet

Our Quarantine Reading List

Sarah Orne Jewett seated on a rock in front of the ocean looking out to sea.

We’re all mostly inside these days, with the exception of that daily walk, run or bike ride that keeps you sane and at a safe distance from others. While we lament the many hardships that this pandemic is bringing to our communities, we also invite you to settle in for some quiet, stillness and contemplation. Art has always been a tool to get us through hard times. Here are some old favorites and new works from our collection to help you get through your quarantine. Some of these are available via CloudLibrary as audio or ebooks. You can also contact your favorite local bookseller and order copies of these books. We recommend Longfellow BooksPrint, and Quill. They will send you books and you will help them to stay afloat in this time of crisis!

Poetry

Aldrich, Linda. March and Mad Women. (2012) 
Bouwsma, Julia. Midden. (2018) 
Case, Kristen. Principles of Economics. (2019) 
Greenberg, Arielle. I Live in the Country, & Other Dirty Poems (2020) 
Grumbling, Megan. Booker’s Point. (2016) 
Millay, Edna. Selected Poems of Edna St. Vincent Millay, edited by Timothy F. Jackson. (2016) 
Paul, Mihku. 20th Century Pow-Wow Playland. (2012) 
Potter, Dawn. Chestnut Ridge. (2019) 
Sharkey, Lee. Walking Backwards. (2016) 

Fiction

Beattie, Ann. The State We’re In: Maine Stories. (2016) 
Chute, Carolyn. The Beans of Egypt, Maine. (1995) 
Conley, Susan. Elsey Come Home. (2019) 
Conley, Susan. Paris Was the Place. (2013) 
Dempsey, Joan. This is How It Begins. (2017) 
Jewett, Sarah Orne. A Country Doctor. (1884) 
King, Lily. Euphoria. (2014) 
King, Lily. Writers and Lovers. (2020) 
Moore, Ruth. Second Growth. (1962) 
Pelletier, Cathie. The Funeral Makers. (1986) 
Rogers, Morgan Callan. Red Ruby Heart in a Cold Blue Sea. (2012) 
Spark, Debra. Unknown Caller. (2016) 
Wood, Monica. The One-in-a-Million Boy. (2016) 

Non-Fiction and Memoir

Anderson, Cynthia. Home Now: How 6000 Refugees Transformed an American Town. (2019) 
Bailey, Elisabeth Tova. The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating. (2010) 
Beam, Lura. A Maine Hamlet. (1957) 
Brown, Wendy and Eric. Browsing Nature’s Aisles: A Year of Foraging for Wild Food in the Suburbs. (2013) 
Brox, Jane. Silence: A Social History of One of the Least Understood Elements of Our Lives. (2019) 
Coleman, Melissa. This Life Is in Your Hands: One Dream, Sixty Acres, and a Family Undone. (2011) 
Damrosch, Barbara and Eliot Coleman. The Four Season Farm Gardener’s Cookbook. (2013) 
Gillis, Christina Marsden. Where the Edges Don’t Hold: A Small Island Miscellany. (2017) 
Ptacin, Mira. The In-Betweens: The Spiritualists, Mediums, and Legends of Camp Etna. (2019) 
Ptacin, Mira. Poor Your Soul. (2016) 
Sarton, May. Journal of a Solitude. (1973) 
Shetterly, Caitlin. Made for You and Me: Going West, Going Broke, Finding Home. (2011)
Shetterly, Caitlin. Modified: GMOs and the Threat to Our Food, Our Land, Our Future. (2016) 
Shetterly, Susan Hand. Settled in the Wild: Notes from the Edge of Town. (2010) 
Thaxter, Celia. An Island Garden. (1894) 
Wood, Monica. When We Were the Kennedys. (2012) 

Children

Agell, Charlotte. The Accidental Adventures of India McAlister. (2010) 
Blakemore, Megan Frazer. The Firefly Code. (2016) 
Cooney, Barbara. Miss Rumphius. (1982) 
Jacobson, Jennifer Richard. Small as an Elephant. (2011) 
Jalali, Reza (illustrated by Anne Sibley O’Brien). Moon Watchers: Shirin’s Ramadan Miracle. (2010) 
Kim, Melissa. A Snowy Owl Story. (2015) 
Savageau, Cheryl. Muskrat Will Be Swimming. (2006) 

Young Adult

Blakemore, Megan Frazer. Very in Pieces. (2015) 
Farish, Terry. The Good Braider. (2013) 
Kaufman, Sashi. Wired Man and Other Freaks of Nature. (2016) 
Padian, Maria. Wrecked. (2016)

Anthologies

Ranzoni, Patricia, ed. Still Mill: Poems, Stories and Songs of Making Paper in Bucksport, Maine, 1930-2014. (2017) 
Senier, Siobhan, ed. Dawnland Voices: An Anthology of Indigenous Writing from New England. (2014) 
Sterling, Meghan and Kathleen Sullivan, eds. A Dangerous New World: Maine Voices on the Climate Crisis. (2019) 

Drama

Gage, Carolyn. The Island Collection: New Plays. (2020)
Millay, Edna St. Vincent. Two Slatterns and a King: A Moral Interlude. (1921)
Plourde, Cathy et al, eds. Out and Allied Volumes 1 and 2: Performance Pieces by LGBTQ Youth and Allies. (2011, 2014)