To broaden your understanding of this unique region, look no farther than the many excellent bookstores (purveying both new and used books) scattered throughout the region. A bookshelf of good reading about northern New England might include these books:
- In the Memory House, by Howard Mansfield (1993). This finely written book by a New Hampshire author provides a penetrating look at New England's sometimes estranged relationship with its own past.
- Inventing New England, by Dona Brown (1995). A University of Vermont professor tells the epic tale of the rise of 19th-century tourism in New England in this well-written study.
- Lobster Gangs of Maine, by James M. Acheson (1988). This exhaustively researched book answers every question you'll have about the lobsterman's life.
- Northern Borders, by Howard Frank Mosher (1994). This magical novel is ostensibly about a young boy living with his taciturn grandparents in northern Vermont, but the book's central character is really Vermont's tough Northeast Kingdom.
- One Man's Meat, by E. B. White. White was a sometime resident of a saltwater farm on the Maine coast and a frequent contributor to The New Yorker. His essays, from the late 1930s and early 1940s, are only incidentally about Maine, but you still get a superb sense of place by observing the shadows.
- Serious Pig, by John Thorne with Matt Lewis Thorne (1996). The way to a region's character is through its stomach. The Thornes' finely crafted essays on Maine regional cooking are exhaustive in their coverage of chowder, beans, pie, and more.
- Vermont Traditions, by Dorothy Canfield Fisher. Written in that somewhat overwrought style popular in the 1950s, this still remains the best survey of the Vermont character.
