Point Dume

By Katie Arnoldi

Surf, pot, growing up and the reality of our nation's relationship with Mexico. Well written, unique and raw this book explores these through a simple story about people growing through their past and meeting each other where they are. 

Without digressing into the banal or cliche, she tells the story of a slice of a California beach lost to development, money and fire. Excellent read. Try to do it in one sitting, the book deserves that kind of attention. 

Book 20

Unbound: A True Story of War, Love and Survival

By Dean King

A page turning book about the Long March the Chinese communists took across the country to establish their modern rule in an ancient country. This book focused mostly on the women, thirty of them in particular, who traveled the 4,000 mile trail. It was a brutal walk with every trial greeting them on the road: altitude, disease, pain, sickness, death. 

The women's equality under the communists was striking and often helped spread the communist message throughout the rural regions they encountered, and relied on, throughout this long march. They were nurses, commanders and soldiers. They believed in the equality they were trying to establish and the freedom the communists brought them with careers, the outlawing of foot binding and education.

For their strength, determination and survival skills these women should be recognized as survivors boldly jumping into the dream for a just and equal China. In the end, many of these women and men who survived this brutal march were also persecuted later on in the Cultural Revolution. 

Book 19