New Books

New in 2008

Quarterboards

By Sharon Hubbard, with photography by Dan Driscoll
Quarterboards explores the tradition on Nantucket of naming homes and adorning them with the type of stunning signs found on ships. ‘Sconset’s 1680 house Shanunga, for example, takes its name from the quarter board salvaged from the wreck of a schooner in 1852. Striking photography throughout captures the unique charm of Nantucket’s historic homes, bringing the deftly woven narrative filled with colorful characters and fascinating anecdotes to life. 2008, $39.95 hardcover

New in 2007

Among the Stars:
The Life of Maria Mitchell

By Margaret Moore Booker
“Meticulously researched and fluidly written, Margaret Moore Booker’s Among the Stars provides the fullest, most nuanced portrait of Maria Mitchell to date. A landmark achievement that shows how a young woman from Nantucket had a lasting impact on science, education, and women’s rights in America and the world.” – Nathaniel Philbrick, author of Away Off Shore, In the Heart of the Sea,and Mayflower

Few avenues of high achievement were open to American women in the mid-nineteenth century, but a young librarian on Nantucket Island, off the coast of Cape Cod, sent a startling signal through the male-dominated world of science when she emerged as an accomplished astronomer. Maria Mitchell, peering into the heavens with a telescope from a rooftop on Main Street, not only discovered a comet, but computed its orbit and exchanged scientific observations with the world’s leading astronomers. She became an admired figure on the international scene, a much-beloved professor at Vassar College, and a leading figure in the emerging women’s rights movement. 2007, $59.95 hardcover