Sarah Vowell, known to many as the voice of Violet in The Incredibles, has also been, with her unforgettable voice, a regular contributor to Chicago Public Radio's This American Life. She has written four books. Her sharp wit, quirky humor, and intelligence are evident in both sound and print.

"Any writer who can put James A. Garfield and Lou Reed in the same sentence leaves me in slack-jawed awe," wrote Charles Matthews of the San Jose Mercury News. But Vowell does this all the time, as on This American Life in April 2007 when she stated that explorer John Charles Fremont's "iconic moment," climbing what he thought was the highest peak in the Rockies, was "what crossing the Delaware was to Washington, what tripping over the ottoman was to Dick Van Dyke."

Radio On

From the Introduction:
"Radio is a landscape, a place inhabited by heroes and villains. And I should know. I spent a year in the broadcast badlands of 1995, which is 325 days longer than Christ suffered in the wilderness (and he didn't have to take notes). But this book is not just a road map of radioland, but of love and hate. My love. My hate. I was twenty-five years old."

Take the Cannoli

From the dust jacket:
"While tackling subjects such as identity, politics, religion, art, and history, these autobiographical tales are written with a biting humor, placing Vowell solidly in the tradition of Mark Twain and Dorothy Parker. Vowell searches the streets of Hoboken for traces of the town's favorite son, Frank Sinatra. She goes under cover of heavy makeup in an investigation of goth culture, blasts cannonballs into a hillside on a father-daughter outing, and maps her family's haunted history on a road trip down the Trail of Tears."

The Partly Cloudy Patriot

"Vowell's collection of essays explores patriotism and other aspects of contemporary life from the refreshingly contrarian view of a thoughtfully disaffected, wryly outspoken and deeply passionate citizen." - Hartford Courant

Assassination Vacation

Originally intended as a book about all presidential assassinations and attempts, the focus was narrowed to those of Lincoln, Garfield, and McKinley when Vowell learned Robert Todd Lincoln was either present or nearby for all three events.

From the back cover:
"Though the themes of loss and violence are explored and we make detours to see how the Republican Party became the Republican Party, there are all kinds of lighter diversions along the way into the lives of the three presidents and their assassins, including mummies, show tunes, mean-spirited totem poles, and a nineteenth-century biblical sex cult."

The Incredibles (Two-Disc Collector's Edition)

"Pixar's new animated action-comedy, about a superhero family stuck in middle-class suburban exile, comes tantalizingly close to greatness." - A.O. Scott, New York Times

"Provides all the wonder and excitement to be wrought from the superhero genre while making fun of itself in gut-busting ways." George Wu - Culturevulture.net

The Incredibles (UMD Mini For PSP) 

Violet Parr Action Figure from Disney's The Incredibles

Sarah talks about being a superhero in Vowellet, a nine-minute film available on YouTube that will open in a new window when you click on the title.