Captivity, corruption, escapes, flights in truth and fantasy, murder, messages from the dead, revenge, suicide …     The stuff of thriller fiction. But in the lives of authors Donald Shomette, Helena Mann-Melnitchenko and Eugene Melnitchenko, such events were terribly real.

Summer Reading Clubs at Anne Arundel and Calvert county public libraries give you ideas, company and rewards for summer reading. At every branch, clubs start this week for children, teens, families and adults. Each age group reads for prizes as well as pleasure.

For wonder-filled, read-aloud picture books, look for author Jane Yolen. Her Caldecott-winning father-daughter tale, Owl Moon, should not be missed: “When you go owling, you don’t need words or warm or anything but hope.”     Also look for Sacred Places, poems and paintings on 12 magical spots around the world; and Ring of Earth, a child’s book of seasons told through animal-voiced poems.

The world of famous poets is small. The past hundred years have produced a handful of poets whose names are immediately recognizable: Robert Frost, Dylan Thomas, ee cummings, Maya Angelou, with space here for your own favorite.

How do you think our Bay conservation efforts are going? You love Chesapeake Bay, and so do I. But are we stopping the blooms of pollution? Can we foresee plentiful crab feasts? Will we dive off our piers this summer to splash and gambol in the Bay’s once-inviting depths?

  I’d like to say that I saw Raymond McAlwee’s book as soon as I walked into the Fenwick Island bookstore. But my eyes were first riveted to the mound of beckoning crab balls laid out for the store’s patrons. Munching away, I then saw the pile of books he had for sale, and I learned that the recipe for the delicious crab dish was from the same book. I went back to the plate for more of the crab, and later back to McAlwee for tales of Chesapeake Bay.  

  Annapolis sparked a love story 40 years ago when Iain Baird took the girl he’d marry sailing for their first date. Life’s strange journey took them back where it began for retirement — with Hurricane Isabelle in their rearview mirror. But before Annapolis the second time around came Virginia, Louisiana and two more deadly storms: Hurricane Katrina and prostate cancer. Baird has written Two Storms: Prostate Cancer and Katrina in New Orleans to chronicle his tale of surviving the Big C in the Big Easy, post-Katrina. 

The last seven words in Michael Herr’s bestseller Dispatches lament: “Vietnam, Vietnam, Vietnam, we’ve all been there.” Well, yes and no.