Book picks similar to
Slingshots (A Hip-Hop Poetica) by Kevin Coval
poetry
chicago
catalog
la-poesie
Bluets
Maggie Nelson - 2009
With Bluets, Maggie Nelson has entered the pantheon of brilliant lyric essayists.
It Will End with Us
Sam Savage - 2014
Henry Prize for "Cigarettes"“Sam Savage manages to be both artful and literal-minded in this faux autobiographical tale of childhood and a mother afflicted and finally driven mad by her wish for artistic success. Savage writes knowingly about the uncertainties of childhood memory, but creates a convincing world of sibling combat and adult pretension. A wonderful, absorbing novel.”—C. Michael Curtis, Fiction Editor, The Atlantic Monthly“If the world—all its hysteric noise—was muted for just one minute, Sam Savage is what you might be fortunate enough to hear. His elegant laconism, his leaps across the self-evident, his soft aplomb, and the rarified air he bestows upon the mundane make him the only American writer worthy of the label the true eccentric."—Valeria LuiselliIt Will End With Us is Sam Savage’s latest deep dive into the mind and voice of a character, and his most personal work yet. Brick by textual brick, his narrator, Eve, builds a memorial to the mother who raised her, emotionally abandoned her, and shaped her in her own image. Eve’s memories summon a childhood in rural South Carolina, a decaying house on impoverished soil, and an insular society succumbing to the influences of a wider world. It Will End With Us is a portrait of a place full of hummingbirds and wild irises, but also of frustration and grief. It is the story of a family tragedy, provoked by a mother’s stifled ambitions, and seized by the wide-open gaze of a child. Rarely has a novel so brief taken on so much, so powerfully.Sam Savage is the best-selling author of Firmin: Adventures of a MetropolitanLowlife, The Cry of the Sloth, Glass, and The Way of the Dog, all from CoffeeHouse Press. A finalist for the Barnes & Noble Discover Great New WritersAward, Savage holds a PhD in philosophy from Yale University and resides inMadison, Wisconsin.
Crossroads
Jonathan Franzen - 2021
Russ Hildebrandt, the associate pastor of a liberal suburban church, is on the brink of breaking free of a marriage he finds joyless--unless his wife, Marion, who has her own secret life, beats him to it. Their eldest child, Clem, is coming home from college on fire with moral absolutism, having taken an action that will shatter his father. Clem's sister, Becky, long the social queen of her high-school class, has sharply veered into the counterculture, while their brilliant younger brother Perry, who's been selling drugs to seventh graders, has resolved to be a better person. Each of the Hildebrandts seeks a freedom that each of the others threatens to complicate.Jonathan Franzen's novels are celebrated for their unforgettably vivid characters and for their keen-eyed take on contemporary America. Now, in Crossroads, Franzen ventures back into the past and explores the history of two generations. With characteristic humor and complexity, and with even greater warmth, he conjures a world that resonates powerfully with our own.A tour de force of interwoven perspectives and sustained suspense, its action largely unfolding on a single winter day, Crossroads is the story of a Midwestern family at a pivotal moment of moral crisis. Jonathan Franzen's gift for melding the small picture and the big picture has never been more dazzlingly evident.
Diary of a Mosquito Abatement Man
John Porcellino - 2005
Over the course of 15 years and 64 issues of his much-loved, self published 'zine KING-CAT Comics and Stories, John has chronicled his life and the world around him with honesty, grace, and intelligence. "Diary" compiles stories from a decade's worth of KING-CAT on the subject of his years spent as a mosquito exterminator. From early, scratchy punk drawings to later, more refined work (as well as 30 brand-new pages created specifically for this edition...), John examines his time on the job, and how it affected his life, his health, and his view of the world.
Fast and Furious: Barack Obama's Bloodiest Scandal and Its Shameless Cover-Up
Katie Pavlich - 2012
While other scandals involve money, Fast and Furious involves lives, including that of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, gunned down with a weapon that the federal government put in the hands of Mexico’s narco-terrorists. As shocking as Operation Fast and Furious was—and this book explains, in chilling detail, just what this operation conducted by the ATF, under the supervision of the Justice Department, entailed—equally appalling is the blatant cover-up of wrongdoing by the Obama administration. No reporter has been more dogged in tracking down the facts about Fast and Furious than Katie Pavlich. In her stunning new book she reveals:The documents that undermine the White House’s claims of ignorance about Fast and FuriousHow Eric Holder, President Obama’s attorney general, has, under oath, repeatedly changed his testimonyThe still mounting death toll from Fast and FuriousThe retaliation against Fast and Furious whistleblowersWhy Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano might be charged with perjuryThe Obama administration’s continuing assault on Second Amendment rightsWhy Fast and Furious could be a bigger scandal than WatergateUnraveling the mystery of what Fast and Furious was all about, Katie Pavlich delivers a stunning indictment of a radical administration willing to trample the Constitution and risk lives to achieve its ideological goals.
West-Running Brook
Robert Frost - 1928
in 1928, and containing woodcuts by J. J. Lankes.The title of the poem that the volume is named by is very significant. Where the poem takes place (Derry, New Hampshire), due to its location near the coast, all rivers flow towards the ocean except for West Running Brook (a real brook), which goes westward making itself unique. In the same way, the poet trusts himself to go by contraries.Because of this book, Robert Frost is called "Home-Spun Philosopher".
The Last Bachelor
Jay McInerney - 2009
In true McInerney style, this new collection of stories examines post 9/11 America in all its dark and morally complex glory
Headless
Benjamin Weissman - 2004
. . an alphabet soup of -delight in language. Eat up."—Alice Sebold"Brilliant. Wildly inventive, profane, and hilarious."—Bret Easton EllisThe author of the acclaimed cult classic Dear Dead Person ("refreshing, nauseating, hilarious"—Kirkus) returns with this long-awaited collection of brilliantly written and outrageously imaginative short stories.Benjamin Weissman is the author of Dear Dead Person (High Risk/Serpent’s Tail, 1995). He is a contributing editor to Bomb Magazine and writes regularly for the contemporary art magazines Parkett and Artforum. A painter and a professor at Art Center College of Design and Otis College of the Arts, he now lives in Los Angeles.
A history of the United States
Cecil Chesterton - 1919
This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.
If You Lived Here, I'd Know Your Name: News from Small-Town Alaska
Heather Lende - 2005
There's no traffic light and no mail delivery; people can vanish without a trace and funerals are a community affair. Heather Lende posts both the obituaries and the social column for her local newspaper. If anyone knows the going-on in this close-knit town—from births to weddings to funerals—she does. Whether contemplating the mysterious death of eccentric Speedy Joe, who wore nothing but a red union suit and a hat he never took off, not even for a haircut; researching the details of a one-legged lady gold miner's adventurous life; worrying about her son's first goat-hunting expedition; observing the awe-inspiring Chilkat Bald Eagle Festival; or ice skating in the shadow of glacier-studded mountains, Lende's warmhearted style brings us inside her small-town life. We meet her husband, Chip, who owns the local lumber yard; their five children; and a colorful assortment of quirky friends and neighbors, including aging hippies, salty fishermen, native Tlingit Indians, and volunteer undertakers—as well as the moose, eagles, sea lions, and bears with whom they share this wild and perilous land. Like Bailey White's tales of Southern life or Garrison Keillor's reports from the Midwest, NPR commentator Heather Lende's take on her offbeat Alaskan hometown celebrates life in a dangerous and breathtakingly beautiful place.
Short Stories
Edith Wharton - 1911
The seven stories in this excellent collection demonstrate the author's ability to create memorable tales on themes of love and marriage, divorce, the experience of the artist, high society and its workings and other topics."Souls Belated," a tragedy of mores, focuses on characters overcome by the demands of convention, while "The Pelican" and "The Muse's Tragedy" both present women whose realities differ from their public personae. "Expiation" is a satiric, revealing story about the publishing industry, featuring a writer determined to increase the sales of her first novel. In "The Dilettante," a young man who prides himself on his ability to manipulate women must face ironic consequences when he introduces his fiancée to his supposed lover. "Xingu" is a witty satire on the intellectual pretensions of a group of rich women, while "The Other Two" presents a darkly humorous look at the consequences of divorce.Gathered in this inexpensive volume, these stories provide an excellent sampling of Wharton's masterly efforts in the short story genre, a form of fiction she felt especially suited to her talents and one that enabled her to achieve a focused and intimate realism.
I Wrote This for You and Only You
Iain S. Thomas - 2018
I wrote this for you. I wrote this for you and only you. Everyone else who reads it, doesn't get it."The follow-up to the international #1 bestselling collection of prose and photography, I Wrote This For You And Only You is the third book in the I Wrote This For You series and gathers together the very best entries in the project from 2011 to 2015. Started in 2007, I Wrote This For You is an internationally acclaimed exploration of hauntingly beautiful words, photography and emotion that's unique to each person that reads it.
Film for Her
Orion Carloto - 2020
Through photographs, poetry, prose, and a short story, Orion Carloto invites readers to remember the forgotten and reach into the past, find comfort in the present, and make sense of the intangible future. Film photography isn’t just eye candy; it’s timeless and romantic—the ideal complement to Carloto’s writing. In Film for Her, much like a visual diary, word and image are intertwined in a book perfect for both gift and self-purchase.
Forever Words: The Unknown Poems
Johnny Cash - 2016
In his newly discovered poems and song lyrics, we see the world through his eyes. The poetry reveals his depth of understanding, both of the world around him and within - his frailties and his strengths alike. He pens verses in his hallmark voice, reflecting upon love, pain, freedom, fame and mortality.Illustrated with facsimile reproductions of Cash's own handwritten pages, Forever Words is a remarkable new addition to the canon of one of America's heroes. His music is a part of our collective history, but here he demonstrates the depth of his talent as a writer.Edited and with an introduction by Paul Muldoon, as well as a preface by John Carter Cash, this is a book sure to delight and surprise fans the world over.