Dr. Spencer Crew — Executive director and chief executive officer, National Underground Railroad Freedom Center:

        Runaway Slaves by John Hope Franklin and Loren Schweninger (Oxford University Press; $17.95).

        “I am reading it to get a better understanding of the human and individual side of the runaway experience. It is also the first time a database has been created to analyze quantitatively the who, what, where and how of the runaway experience.

        “The strength of the book is gaining the ability to better see the participants in the runaway experience as people with hopes, dreams and dignity.”

       Tamara Lenz Muente — Communications officer, Taft Museum of Art:

        Travels with Charley: In Search of America by John Steinbeck (Viking Press; $9).

        “Travels with Charley is John Steinbeck's memoir of his 1950s road trip across America with his elderly poodle, Charley. Steinbeck vividly describes the particulars of America and its people with such skill and candor you feel like you are traveling with him.

        “I appreciate this book's realism. Rather than generating nostalgia, Steinbeck reflects on a country in transition struggling with overcrowded cities and dying small towns, on the loneliness and isolation that connects the people he meets, and on the growing homogeneity of American culture — issues we are still grappling with 50 years later.

        “On another level, it's about the uncomplicated relationship between a man and his dog.”

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