Books with author William Wyatt Bell

The Picnic in the Rain by William F. Bell, recipient of the 2012 Richard Wilbur Award, is a powerful and unique first book written by an elderly poet who s willing to honestly reconsider his past--his loves, aspirations, failures, and re-determinations. The renowned literary critic William Pritchard finds a very sympathetic voice in the carefully-crafted verses of William F. Bell: What comes through in these poems is an attractive human being, passionate, nostalgic, always being sure not to take the easy way out from experience recounted. There s nothing complacent about these poems.

"EVERYTHING'S CHANGED...EVERYTHING'S GONE BAD."Fifteen-year-old Bryan Troupe is at first indifferent to the bitter dispute between loggers and "tree-huggers" that splits the community of Nootka harbour on Vancouver Island. But when a similar rift divides his own family and affects his relationship with his girlfriend, Bryan becomes relentlessly drawn into the centre of an environmental conflict that shatters his entire way of life.

Lee wants to be a Tarantula – a member of the biggest, most powerful gang in his neighbourhood. But when his initiation goes wrong and the police catch him robbing an auto supply store, Lee’s father sends him to live with his aunt in New Toronto. Lee feels more lost than ever. His mother’s death from cancer, and his father’s constant absence working two jobs mean he has practically had to raise himself. But though he initially resists his Aunt Reena and the customers of Reena’s Unique Café – a ragtag collection of the unusual, the unkempt and the deeply eccentric – Lee gradually learns to open himself up to his new surroundings. When Lee strikes up an unlikely friendship he is suddenly confronted by the ravages of violence, and is forced to face the consequences of his own aggression.The Blue Helmet is a powerful portrait of one young man’s struggle to come into his own, and the peace that comes from the achievement.From the Hardcover edition.

Poking around a sacred Indian burial ground in the middle of the night with her brother, John, isn't Karen Stone's idea of a great way to start off the summer. But she lets John talk her into it, and the two are plunged into a world they never imagined existed - a world where past and present blend, where the spirits of the dead communicate with the living. With the help of John's classmate, Weird Noah Webster, an expert on all things supernatural, Karen and John try to unravel the mystery that surrounds them. At times amused and fascinated, at times terrified, Karen is forced to confront something she has been running from for far too long.

The son of a Jewish father and black mother, high school senior Zack has never been allowed to meet his mother's family, but after doing a research project on a former slave, he travels from his home in Canada to Natchez, Mississippi to find his grandfather.The son of a Jewish father and black mother, Zack has never been allowed to meet his mother's family, but after doing a research project on a former slave, he travels to Natchez, Mississippi, to find his grandfather.