In her critically acclaimed new novel, Shay Youngblood, the Pushcart Prize-winning author of Soul Kiss, chronicles the Parisian odyssey of a young African-American woman retracing the footsteps of the literary legends who inspired her.

    Diagnosed with MS, she awaits the results of another anxiety-inducing MRI. She’s just walked away from Connor, “a fixer” but possibly the love of her life. And nearing the holidays, the sights and sounds of winter in South Dakota only prick memories of better years gone by. Then, on a December morning at the university where she works, jarring gunshots pierce the halls. In a temporary safe place and terrified, Simone listens and pretends this will all be over soon.As she waits for silence, her mind racing, Simone’s past year comes into focus. Falling in love and missing it. Finding strength in family and enduring friendships. Planning for the future, fearing it, and hoping against hope in dark places. Her life has been changing at the speed of light, and each crossroad brought Simone here, to this day, to endure the things she can’t control and to confront those that she can.

    In this new Harper Paperback edition, all four shows are compiled into one phenomenally entertaining volume.Mambo Mouth (1991), Leguizamo's first show, was an off Broadway sensation. Leguizamo's portrayal of seven different Latino characters earned him both Obie and Outer Critics Circle awards. His follow up, Spic–O–Rama (1993), a "dysfunctional family comedy," presents 24–hours in the life of one family. It enjoyed a sold–out run in Chicago before relocating to New York where it won its creator a Drama Desk Award. Freak (1998), Leguizamo's Broadway debut, is his own coming–of–age story. A "demi–semi–quasi–pseudo–autobiography," the show was a critical and commercial success and won an Emmy when it was shown on TV. Sexaholix: A Love Story (2001), based on the sold–out national tour of John Leguizamo Live! was nominated for an Outer Critics Circle Award as well as a Tony Award.Alternately hilarious and poignant, always candid and searingly intelligent, The Works of John Leguizamo is a must–have for fans of this inimitable performer.

    Shortly after, he came back to Stratford to play Richard III – a breakthrough performance that would transform his career, winning him the Olivier and Evening Standard Awards for Best Actor. Sher’s record of the making of this historic theatrical event, Year of the King, has become a classic of theatre writing, a unique insight into the creation of a landmark Shakespearean performance.More than thirty years later, Antony Sher returned to Lear, this time in the title role, for the 2016 RSC production directed by Gregory Doran. Sher’s performance was acclaimed by the Telegraph as ‘a crowning achievement in a major career’, and the show transferred from Stratford to London’s Barbican. Once again, he kept a diary, capturing every step of his personal and creative journey to opening night.Year of the Mad King: The Lear Diaries is Sher’s account of researching, rehearsing and performing what is arguably Shakespeare’s most challenging role, known as the Everest of Acting. His strikingly honest, illuminating and witty commentary provides an intimate, first-hand look at the development of his Lear and of the production as a whole. Also included is a selection of his paintings and sketches, many reproduced in full colour.Like his Year of the King and Year of the Fat Knight: The Falstaff Diaries, this book, Year of the Mad King, offers a fascinating perspective on the process of one of the greatest Shakespearean actors of his generation.'One of the finest books I have ever read on the process of acting' Time Out on Year of the King'Antony Sher's insider journal is a brilliant exploded view of a great actor at work – modest and gifted, self-centred and selfless – a genius capable of transporting us backstage' Craig Raine, The Spectator (Books of the Year) on Year of the Fat Knight

    Bringing to life a cast of eccentric, unforgettable characters, Lana Witt weaves a tale of epic dimension in a small rural town definitely worth a visit.When wayward Californian Tom Jetts rolls his broken-down car into remote Pick, Kentucky, he finds himself in a town among friends, enemies, and lovers who are playing out tales as old as the prehistoric soil beneath their feet.

    Frightened by her own child, Keri searches for help, quickly learning that the mental health community can only offer her a seventy-two hour hold. After these three days Trina is off on her own again. Fed up with the bureaucracy and determined to save her daughter by any means necessary, Keri signs on for an illegal intervention known as The Program, launching them both on a terrifying journey.

    It is the moment when the universe suffers a crisis of conscience. Should it expand or make a great big bang? It decides to wind the clock back a decade to 1991, making everyone in the world endure ten years of deja-vu and a total loss of free will - not to mention the torture of reliving every nanosecond of one of the tawdiest and most hollow decades. With his trademark wicked wit, Vonnegut addresses memory, suicide, the Great Depression, the loss of American eloquence, and the obsolescent thrill of reading books.

    She made her fortune and now she hob nobs with the very rich and occasionally the semi-famous, and she enjoys luxuries she only dreamed of as a middle-class kid growing up in Potomac, Maryland. But despite it all, she can't ignore the fact that she isn't necessarily happy. In fact, lately Ramie has begun to feel more than a little empty.On a boat with friends off the Florida coast, she tries to fight her feelings of discontent with steel will and hard liquor. No one even notices as she gets up and goes to the diving board and dives off...Suddenly Ramie is waking up, straining to understand a voice calling in the distance...It's her mother: "Wake up! You're going to be late for school again. I'm not writing a note this time..."Ramie finds herself back on the eve of her eighteenth birthday, with a second chance to see the people she's lost and change the choices she regrets. How did she get back here? Has she gone off the deep end? Is she really back in time? Above all, she'll have to answer the question that no one else can: What it is that she really wants from the past, and for her future?

    He has a knack for creating effective ad campaigns. His work lands him a gig in London. Far away from his Philly roots, Chris is raking in the dough, has a Nigerian girlfriend, a beautiful apartment, and goes clubbing in the West End. He enjoys the role of the successful black American, living among the bourgeois Africans and West Indians of London. No longer afraid of what he calls the 'Pop pop pop' of gunfire so prevalent on the streets of his hometown, Chris is finally free.But life takes a turn for the worse, and Chris finds himself back where he started, forced back to Philadelphia where his only job prospect is answering phones at the electrical company, helping the poor pay their heating and lighting bills. Surrounded by his brethren, the down and out, indigent, the hopeless, Chris hits bottom. Only a stroke of inspiration and faith will get him back on his feet. Drop is a funny, moving and ultimately profound tale of a man determined to break the pattern of the ghetto he despises and who, in the process, is forced to come to terms with his hatred for himself.

    To open this spirited collection, Irving explains how he became a writer. There follow six scintillating stories written over the last twenty years ending with a homage to Charles Dickens. This irresistible collection cannot fail to delight and charm.The first collection of short pieces--two of them previously unpublished--by the author of The World According to Garp includes memoirs, six short stories, and essays on Charles Dickens and Gu+a5nter Grass. Reprint. Tour.This gem, a delightful collection of shorter works, both fiction and nonfiction, written by one of the country's finest--and funniest--writers, includes a living portrait of Irving's grandmother, a new, never-before-published essay, six scintillating short stories--including the O. Henry Award-winning "Interior Space"--and two essays on Irving's favorite 19th-century novelist, Charles Dickens. Trying to Save Piggy Sneed is John Irving at the top of his form.

    But when she returns, it's only the beginning of her family's journey.

    Set against the ever-building pressure and pace of a large Boston medical center, the tensions flare-and explode-when a surgical operation tragically ends in death, raising countless questions. Was it accidental malpractice? A violation of the Hippocratic oath? Or cold-blooded murder?

    Along the way she weathers unplanned losses of altitude, air pressure, and landing gear. With the help of a squad of loyal, funny, wise friends and massage therapists, she learns to sort truth from self-deception, self-involvement from self-possession.At last, having found a new partner “who loves Don DeLillo and the NHL” and a daughter “who needs you to teach her to dive and to laugh at herself”—not to mention two dogs and two horses—“staying home becomes more of an option. Maybe.”

    Their story is one of hardship, violence, and cautious, heartbreaking attempts toward compassion. Lesley's fearless journey through his family history provides a remarkable portrait of hard living in the Western states, and confirms his place as one of the region's very best storytellers.

    Shantaram is narrated by Lin, an escaped convict with a false passport who flees maximum security prison in Australia for the teeming streets of a city where he can disappear.Accompanied by his guide and faithful friend, Prabaker, the two enter Bombay's hidden society of beggars and gangsters, prostitutes and holy men, soldiers and actors, and Indians and exiles from other countries, who seek in this remarkable place what they cannot find elsewhere.As a hunted man without a home, family, or identity, Lin searches for love and meaning while running a clinic in one of the city's poorest slums, and serving his apprenticeship in the dark arts of the Bombay mafia. The search leads him to war, prison torture, murder, and a series of enigmatic and bloody betrayals. The keys to unlock the mysteries and intrigues that bind Lin are held by two people. The first is Khader Khan: mafia godfather, criminal-philosopher-saint, and mentor to Lin in the underworld of the Golden City. The second is Karla: elusive, dangerous, and beautiful, whose passions are driven by secrets that torment her and yet give her a terrible power.Burning slums and five-star hotels, romantic love and prison agonies, criminal wars and Bollywood films, spiritual gurus and mujaheddin guerrillas—this huge novel has the world of human experience in its reach, and a passionate love for India at its heart. Based on the life of the author, it is by any measure the debut of an extraordinary voice in literature.