Within these pages are twenty-five complete stories of murder in the North Country. The perpetrators range from average citizens to some of the worst degenerates imaginable. Their methods run the gamut from poison to clubs to knives to guns to axes, while their stories contain shocking revelations and remarkable twists, far too many to count. And some are just plain unusual.

The Black Woods chronicles the history of Black pioneers in New York's northern wilderness. From the late 1840s into the 1860s, they migrated to the Adirondacks to build farms and to vote. On their new-worked land, they could meet the $250 property requirement New York's constitution imposed on Black voters in 1821, and claim the rights of citizenship. Three thousand Black New Yorkers were gifted with 120,000 acres of Adirondack land by Gerrit Smith, an upstate abolitionist and heir to an immense land fortune. Smith's suffrage-seeking plan was endorsed by Frederick Douglass and most leading Black abolitionists. The antislavery reformer John Brown was such an advocate that in 1849 he moved his family to Timbuctoo, a new Black Adirondack settlement in the woods. Smith's plan was prescient, anticipating Black suffrage reform, affirmative action, environmental distributive justice, and community-based racial equity more than a century before these were points of public policy. But when the response to Smith's offer fell radically short of his high hopes, Smith's zeal cooled. Timbuctoo, Freemen's Home, Blacksville and other settlements were forgotten. History would marginalize this Black community for 150 years. In The Black Woods, Amy Godine recovers a robust history of Black pioneers who carved from the wilderness a future for their families and their civic rights. Her immersive story returns the Black pioneers and their descendants to their rightful place at the center of this history. With stirring accounts of racial justice, and no shortage of heroes, The Black Woods amplifies the unique significance of the Adirondacks in the American imagination.

Adirondack Kaleidoscope is every bit as intriguing as the optical toy that has been popular for almost 200 years. Like the everchanging patterns one can see through the cylinder, the stories in this collection vary widely and keep the reader eager to see what the next story will be about. History, folklore, childhood memories, stories about famous people who spent time in the Adirondacks, how the park became forever wild, and fascinating human-interest stories about everyday life from the pioneer days up through the 1970s are all here. Adirondack Kaleidoscope is not necessarily a front-to-back book. You can open it at random and soon find an easy and enjoyable read that could be anything from informative to hilarious to tragic. perhaps more than anything, Adirondack Kaleidoscope is a priceless scrapbook that takes readers and drops them some where in the Adirondack Mountains for a look around, sometimes more than a century ago. It could well take its place among classics about this beloved region.

The authors, Kim Ladd and Pam Ladd, visited over 120 bars inside the Blue Line and chose their own 46 High Peaks--bars, taverns, and inns with elevations that measure above average, show promise of longevity, offer diversity, and are venues that anyone would find comfortable. Those that were hard to cut from the High Peaks are listed as Trailheads--worthy of a visit if you're in the neighborhood. The Adirondack Park is 9,375 square miles, or 6.1 million acres. Kim and Pam covered it. Given the size of the park, they decided to break it into five regions: Foothills, Eastern Lakes, Southern & Sacandaga, High Peaks, and Western Wilderness. This Adirondack bar guide contains reviews of 46 bars, a summary of their amenities at-a-glance, and a brief outline of the Trailheads, all listed by region. The recipe section features the authors' own drink recipes, and signature drink recipes contributed by many of the High Peaks bars.