$19.95 hardcover 978-0-89587-331-6 0-89587-331-1 $12.95 paperback 978-0-89587-330-9 0-89587-330-3 5 x 8 228 pages 40 black-and-white photographs July History/Regional Press Release (PDF)

After a week-long family vacation on Topsail Island, McAllister went home and wrote a newspaper column about the place where everyone goes 10 miles per hour under the speed limit. This column brought a deluge of responses from his readers who shared his appreciation for this barrier island off the coast of North Carolina. As if caught in a time warp, Topsail resembles the resorts of decades past. It has the small-town feel of a family beach, a place with few commercial trappings whose devotees return generation after generation. McAllister blends interviews with the people who know the island with stories of early pirates, devastating hurricanes, a 1940s dig in search of a 1630 Spanish galleon's treasure, the U.S. government's secret rocket program, a modern-day sea-turtle preservation project, and a black bear that came to stroll the beach. In this book, McAllister tells the many stories of Topsail with the help of those who love the island best. about the author Ray McAllister has been a columnist for the Richmond Times-Dispatch for 18 years. He lives in Richmond, Virginia.

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