If you love to relax with a good book a summer day, try a work from a local author
Ah, summer. Time for fun and relaxation.
Is your idea of real relaxation to sit by the pool, on the beach or on your porch or patio with a new book and let your mind wander?
Why not add a book by a local author to your summer reading list?
We've put together a sampling of recently published works by authors with local ties for your summer reading pleasure. They include books for both adults and children, and fiction and nonfiction.
Happy reading!
Black Antietam: African Americans and the Civil War in Sharpsburg
For general readers and history fans alike, this book tells the stories of the many African Americans, both enslaved and free, who lived through one of the Civil War's bloodiest battles. Antietam was a turning point in Black history, but it has never before been examined through the experiences of Black eyewitnesses.
Genre: History
Author: Emilie Amt, 62, of Hagerstown, a retired history professor at Hood College
Publisher: The History Press
Price: $21.99
Website: https://www.arcadiapublishing.com/Products/9781467150729
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DrEmilieAmtHistorian
Black Antietam: African Americans and the Civil War in Sharpsburg is available from local bookstores or online
More about Emily Amt: For many escaping slavery, Hagerstown was a connection point
Battle to Save the Bay
Donna Burgess, a recent high school graduate, is thrust into a campaign with the Chesapeake Bay Coalition to stop a renegade company from polluting Baltimore's harbor and the bay. But a saboteur is hiding in their midst, wrecking their plans and endangering their lives.
Genre: Eco-thriller
Author: Ron Chandler, 56, a freelance writer from Owings Mills, Md.
Publisher: Kindle - digital; Independently published - paperback
Price: $1.99 on Kindle, $8.99 paperback
Website: Author profiles are on Amazon.com and Goodreads.com. Readers can order Battle to Save the Bay today on Amazon.com
Mission: Get Daddy Better
Mission: Get Daddy Better is the lighthearted story of Evie and Declan covertly helping Daddy recover from a brain injury through positivity, cooperation and love.
Genre: Children’s book
Author: Todd McElwee, 41, of Hagerstown, associate publisher and associations editor, USAE
Publisher: Opus Self-Publishing/Politics and Prose
Price: $13.99 (hardcopy), $4.99 (Amazon, Apple Books)
Website: missiongetdaddybetter.com
Facebook: facebook.com/MissionGetDaddyBetter
Instagram: instagram.com/missiongetdaddybetterbook/
Twitter: twitter.com/missionbetter1
Mission: Daddy Get Better is available to order on the website, and locally at the Washington County Arts Council Gallery Shop on Potomac Street in Hagerstown, and at Turn the Page Bookstore in Boonsboro.
There’s a Kid under My Bed! Tales of Reggie the Monster
Reggie Scales is a 4-year-old monster beginning pre-school who will tell you that he is not afraid of school or anything else — except for being alone, shadows, thunder and lightning, creepy noises, nighttime, broccoli, monsters that make fun of his eyeglasses, and spooky kids that hide under his bed!
Genre: Children’s book
Name: John J. Schmidt, Ed.D., 75, of Hagerstown, emeritus professor at East Carolina University
Illustrator: Evelyn M. Bergquist
Publisher: Owl Canyon Press, Boulder, Colo.
Price: $24.95 (Hardcover); $14.95 (Paperback)
Website: https://www.owlcanyonpress.com/
There’s a Kid under My Bed! is available at Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble.com, Walmart.com, www.owlcanyonpress.com, Washington County Arts Council, Washington County Museum of Fine Arts and other online booksellers.
Double Play
Double Play is a unique, bargain-priced mystery that contains two complete novels. In “Blue Light Night,” journalist-sleuths Rob and Jennie Covington are drawn into the world of a bizarre serial killer, while in “Out of the Darkness,” they search for a missing journalist and a man awakens from a years-long coma.
Genre: Fiction, mystery
Author: Marshall Scott Shields, 72, of Fairmont, W.Va., a retired former Herald-Mail journalist
Publisher: High Peaks Publishing
Price: $15.95
Website: marshallscottshieldsbooks.blogspot.com
Facebook: Books by Marshall Scott Shields
Double Play is available from Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/dp/1735448494
More from Marshall Scott Shields: Former Herald-Mail editor crafts a mystery
Simone LaFray and the Red Wolves of London
In the second book of the Simone LaFray Mysteries, Simone navigates school rivalries, oversees the opening of a new LaFray's patisserie, and finds herself questioning her loyalties as she prowls under the moonlight with the notorious Red Wolves. The life of the world's most promising young spy is about to get messy.
Genre: Middle grade fiction
Author: S.P. O'Farrell (Steven O'Farrell), 51, of Hagerstown, president of Real Estate Appraisals & Consultations
Publisher: Brandylane Publishers
Price: $3.99~$32.95
Website: www.brandylanepublishers.com
Facebook: Simone LaFray Mysteries
Instagram: s.p.ofarrellofficial
Simone LaFray and the Red Wolves of London is available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Turn the Page Bookstore, Four Seasons Bookstore, 2nd & Charles, Washington County Arts Council and other locations.
This article originally appeared on The Herald-Mail: Let your summer reading include a book by a local author
