Damar, Kansas, is a tiny town in northwest Kansas with a population of less than 115 people, some of whom can trace their lineage back to the early immigrant settlement of the area in the 1880s.

It takes a lot for us to embrace an outsider writing our stories. I sat with Duane West, the prosecutor of the murders of the Clutter family, in his living room for three hours in 2017, and he had quite a bit to say about his distaste for Truman Capote. While I don’t have the same personal animus that our mournfully departed Mr. West had for In Cold Blood, I’ll admit it’s tough for a New Yorker to “get it,” and the readers of this book club often just know when someone has it right.

On January 12, 1888, what began as an ordinary winter morning across the Great Plains became one of the deadliest weather disasters in American history. A sudden Arctic front swept across the prairie with little warning, trapping children on their way home from one-room schools, isolating families, and forever changing the communities that survived it.

This week we are celebrating a towering figure in American music history: Leonard Bernstein.