Texas. 1921: A time of abundance. Elsa Wolcott meets Rafe Martinelli and changes the direction of her life. Her only choice: marriage to a man she barely knows. 1934: Millions are out of work and a drought has broken the Great Plains. Farmers are fighting to keep their land and their livelihoods as the crops are failing, the water is drying up, and dust threatens to bury them all. Elsa Martinelli, like so many of her neighbors, must make an agonizing...

"English anthropologist Andrew Banson has been alone in the field for several years, studying the Kiona river tribe in the Territory of New Guinea. Haunted by the memory of his brothers' deaths and increasingly frustrated and isolated by his research, Bankson is on the verge of suicide when a chance encounter with colleagues, the controversial Nell Stone and her wry and mercurial Australian husband, Fen, pulls him back from the brink. Nell and Fen...

In North River, critically acclaimed, best-selling author Pete Hamill whisks listeners back to 1934-when the Great Depression held New York City in its relentless grip-for a story of one remarkable man's perseverance. Haunted by the horrors of World War I, Dr. James Delaney's personal life is a nightmare. But everything changes when he returns home one day to find his three-year-old grandson on his doorstep.

"Newly engaged, Clive and Henrietta now begin the difficult task of meeting each other's family. "Difficult" because Clive has neglected to tell Henrietta that he is in fact the heir to the Howard estate and fortune, and Henrietta has just discovered that her mother has been hiding secrets about her past as well. When Clive brings Henrietta to the family estate to meet his parents, they are less than enthused about his impoverished intended. Left...

As the members of the garden club in Darling, Alabama, prepare to plant roses for their annual Confederate Day celebration, they find themselves distracted by a series of mysteries involving stolen funds, a secret code, and a local resident's odd behavior.

Set in California apple country in the 1930s, nine hundred migratory workers rise up and join forces to protest unfair wages and working conditions. As the labor strike wears on and conflict grows between the apple pickers and the local growers' association, what begins as a fight for their rights turns into an all-out battle for survival in this star-studded retelling of John Steinbeck's beloved novel.

"Hercule Poirot returns home after an agreeable luncheon to find an angry woman waiting to berate him outside his front door. Her name is Sylvia Rule, and she demands to know why Poirot has accused her of the murder of Barnabas Pandy, a man she has neither heard of nor ever met ... Poirot is equally shocked, because he too has never heard of any Barnabas Pandy, and he certainly did not send the letter in question. He cannot convince Sylvia Rule of...

In this thinly-disguised pseudonymous satire, Madge Lawrence is a "good girl" trying to make it as a screenwriter in Hollywood. As secretary to a big-time producer, Madge learns the movie business from the inside. The story unfolds in a series of documents--memos, telegrams, newspaper items, and letters from Madge to a former colleague in New York.

Suspecting foul play when a mild-mannered villager is found dead, housekeeper Florence Norris investigates a surprise will that reveals dark secrets in the victim's family history.

Showcasing fifty films from 1939, during which the world braced for war, brings to life the most glamorous era in movie history by discussing such works of cinematic art as "Gunga Din," "Goodbye, Mr. Chips," and "Gone With the Wind."