TopPicks Index

Top 3 d a levy Books
d a levy was Cleveland's contribution to the "Beat Generation". A poet, artist, and publisher, he was denounced as a drug cultist by the "Plain Dealer" and prosecuted (unsuccessfully) on obscenity charges. He ended his life just after his 26th birthday in 1963, but his poetry endures.

Top 6 Sherwood Anderson Books
Sherwood Anderson, born in Clyde Ohio, chronicled small town American life, particularly in Ohio. He lived in Cleveland and Elyria during his long life, married four times, wrote nine novels and collections of stories, and hobnobbed with Hemmingway, Faulkner, and F. Scott Fitzgerald. His stories are have depth, yet retain a certain Midwestern naivety.

Top 6 John Bellamy - Cleveland True Crime Tales
John Stark Bellamy, has been called the "Edgar Allan Poe" of Cleveland. His books relate real crime tales taken from periods throughout Cleveland's history. They feature such prominent Clevelanders as Eliot Ness and such infamous murderer cases as the "Torso Murders."

Top 8 Louis Bromfield Books
Louis Bromfield, a native of Mansfield, was a best-selling novelist in the 1930s and 1940s. In addition, he was a decorated World War I hero, a friend to Hollywood's most famous stars including Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall who got married at his Mansfield Farm, and an early champion of organic and self-sustaining farming. He won the Pulitzer Prize for his novel, "Early Autumn".

Top 8 Toni Morrison Books
Toni Morrison was born and raised in Lorain Ohio. She went on to seven moving novels, about growing up and living black in America. Her themes, however, are universal -- ones to which all Americas can relate. Many of her books are set in Ohio. Ms. Morrison has received the Pulitzer Prize as well as the Nobel Prize for literature. She currently a professor at Princeton University as well as founder and sponsor of the "Princeton Atelier" students arts workshop.

Top 10 Les Roberts Novels
Les Roberts is a Cleveland Heights-based writer, best known for his thirteen detective novels, featuring protagonist, Milan Jacovich. The novels are particularly fun for Clevelanders because of the liberal sprinkling of references to Cleveland and the surrounding area.

Top 6 Books by Northeast Ohio Writers
Northeast Ohio has a rich history of writing excellence. Explore these books by area authors, from Pulitzer Prize-winning Toni Morrison to hometown mystery writer, Les Roberts.