Book picks similar to
The Last Bachelor by Jay McInerney


fiction
short-stories
ebooks
letteratura-americana

Mrs. Caliban


Rachel Ingalls - 1982
    Caliban to King Kong, Edgar Allan Poe’s stories, the films of David Lynch, Beauty and the Beast, The Wizard of Oz, E.T., Richard Yates’s domestic realism, B-horror movies, and the fairy tales of Angela Carter—how such a short novel could contain all of these disparate elements is a testament to its startling and singular charm.

No One Belongs Here More Than You


Miranda July - 2007
    Screenwriter, director, and star of the acclaimed film Me and You and Everyone We Know, Miranda July brings her extraordinary talents to the page in a startling, sexy, and tender collection.

The Frozen Deep


Wilkie Collins - 1857
    With her gift of 'Second Sight', Clara foresees terrible tragedy ahead and is racked by guilt. Allied to two different ships, the two men at first have no cause to meet — until disaster strikes and they find themselves united in a battle for survival. It cannot be long before they discover the nature of their rivalry, and the hot-tempered Wardour must choose how to take his revenge.Based on the doomed 1845 expedition to the Arctic, and originally performed as a play starring both Collins and Dickens, 'The Frozen Deep' is a dramatic tale of vengeance and self-sacrifice which went on to inspire the character of Sydney Carton in Charles Dickens' 'A Tale of Two Cities'. NB: This is a separate work by Wilkie Collins It is a novel, published serially in 'Temple Bar' between August and October 1874 and then published as a book, and is not the play of the same name that Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins collaborated on in 1856 and that they both appeared in and that was subsequently published in 1857.

Fidelity: Stories


Michael Redhill - 2003
    With his unflinching attention to emotional detail, Redhill proves once again to be "a writer of considerable humanity and insight" (A.L. Kennedy) .

The Imperfectionists


Tom Rachman - 2010
    Fifty years and many changes have ensued since the paper was founded by an enigmatic millionaire, and now, amid the stained carpeting and dingy office furniture, the staff’s personal dramas seem far more important than the daily headlines. Kathleen, the imperious editor in chief, is smarting from a betrayal in her open marriage; Arthur, the lazy obituary writer, is transformed by a personal tragedy; Abby, the embattled financial officer, discovers that her job cuts and her love life are intertwined in a most unexpected way. Out in the field, a veteran Paris freelancer goes to desperate lengths for his next byline, while the new Cairo stringer is mercilessly manipulated by an outrageous war correspondent with an outsize ego. And in the shadows is the isolated young publisher who pays more attention to his prized basset hound, Schopenhauer, than to the fate of his family’s quirky newspaper. As the era of print news gives way to the Internet age and this imperfect crew stumbles toward an uncertain future, the paper’s rich history is revealed, including the surprising truth about its founder’s intentions. Spirited, moving, and highly original, The Imperfectionists will establish Tom Rachman as one of our most perceptive, assured literary talents.

The Diving Pool: Three Novellas


Yōko Ogawa - 1990
    A lonely teenage girl falls in love with her foster brother as she watches him leap from a high diving board into a pool—a peculiar infatuation that sends unexpected ripples through her life. A young woman records the daily moods of her pregnant sister in a diary, taking meticulous note of a pregnancy that may or may not be a hallucination—but whose hallucination is it, hers or her sister's? A woman nostalgically visits her old college dormitory on the outskirts of Tokyo, a boarding house run by a mysterious triple amputee with one leg.Hauntingly spare, beautiful, and twisted, The Diving Pool is a disquieting and at times darkly humorous collection of novellas about normal people who suddenly discover their own dark possibilities.

Here I Am


Jonathan Safran Foer - 2016
    Unfolding over four tumultuous weeks in present-day Washington, D.C., Here I Am is the story of a fracturing family in a moment of crisis. As Jacob and Julia Bloch and their three sons are forced to confront the distances between the lives they think they want and the lives they are living, a catastrophic earthquake sets in motion a quickly escalating conflict in the Middle East. At stake is the meaning of home - and the fundamental question of how much aliveness one can bear. Showcasing the same high-energy inventiveness, hilarious irreverence, and emotional urgency that readers loved in his earlier work, Here I Am is Foer's most searching, hard-hitting, and grandly entertaining novel yet. It not only confirms Foer's stature as a dazzling literary talent but reveals a novelist who has fully come into his own as one of our most important writers.

Treasury


Maeve Binchy - 2011
    This collection from Australia and around the world gives us stories that are sad and happy, thoughtful and humourous, but always abounding with the author's trade mark generosity of spirit. Families, friends, lovers and the lonely, all are drawn with affection and wisdom.* Elsa makes a Christmas wish at the Statue of Liberty which comes true in a most unexpected way.* Amy opts for the simple life when Dan bites off more than he can chew.* Frankie uses an unexpected trip with Robert to find out what she really wants from their relationship.* Victor, a self-confessed hopeless romantic, accompanies a friend to Australia with no thought of love on his mind.* Nick and Janet meet at the Sydney Fish Markets...everything seems perfect, what could go wrong?* Victoria imagines what it would mean to her widowed father to join her in his beloved Paris for a weekend.* Bran enters a competition to broaden his horizons.

The Lottery


Shirley Jackson - 1948
    Everything has been prepared for the town’s annual tradition—a lottery in which every family must participate, and no one wants to win. “The Lottery” stands out as one of the most famous short stories in American literary history. Originally published in The New Yorker, the author immediately began receiving letters from readers who demanded an explanation of the story’s meaning. “The Lottery” has been adapted for stage, television, radio and film.

Reflections in a Golden Eye


Carson McCullers - 1941
    A powerful and passionate tale is set on a southern army post --a human hell inhabited by a sexually disturbed officer, his animalistic wife, her lover, and the driven young private who forces the drama to its climax...

Exterminator!


William S. Burroughs - 1973
    A perfect servant suddenly reveals himself to be the insidious Dr. Fu Manchu. Science-fantasy wars, racism, corporate capitalism, drug addiction, and various medical and psychiatric horrors all play their parts in this mosaiclike, experimental novel. Here is William S. Burroughs at his coruscating and hilarious best.

All That Is


James Salter - 2013
    It was a time when publishing was still a private affair - a scattered family of small houses here and in Europe - a time of gatherings in fabled apartments, parties into the night. It is a world in which to immerse himself, a world of intimate connections and surprising triumphs. But the deal that Philip cannot seem to close is love: one marriage goes bad; another fails to happen; and, finally, he meets a woman who enthralls, then betrays him, setting him on a course he could never have imagined for himself. Written with Salter's signature economy of prose, All That Is fiercely, fluidly explores a life unfolding in a world on the brink of change: a dazzling, sometimes devastating labyrinth of love and ambition, of the small shocks and grand pleasures of being alive.

The Keeper of Lost Things


Ruth Hogan - 2017
    Forty years ago, he carelessly lost a keepsake from his beloved fiancée, Therese. That very same day, she died unexpectedly. Brokenhearted, Anthony sought consolation in rescuing lost objects—the things others have dropped, misplaced, or accidentally left behind—and writing stories about them. Now, in the twilight of his life, Anthony worries that he has not fully discharged his duty to reconcile all the lost things with their owners. As the end nears, he bequeaths his secret life’s mission to his unsuspecting assistant, Laura, leaving her his house and all its lost treasures, including an irritable ghost.Recovering from a bad divorce, Laura, in some ways, is one of Anthony’s lost things. But when the lonely woman moves into his mansion, her life begins to change. She finds a new friend in the neighbor’s quirky daughter, Sunshine, and a welcome distraction in Freddy, the rugged gardener. As the dark cloud engulfing her lifts, Laura, accompanied by her new companions, sets out to realize Anthony’s last wish: reuniting his cherished lost objects with their owners.Long ago, Eunice found a trinket on the London pavement and kept it through the years. Now, with her own end drawing near, she has lost something precious—a tragic twist of fate that forces her to break a promise she once made.As the Keeper of Lost Objects, Laura holds the key to Anthony and Eunice’s redemption. But can she unlock the past and make the connections that will lay their spirits to rest?Full of character, wit, and wisdom, The Keeper of Lost Things is heartwarming tale that will enchant fans of The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake, Garden Spells, Mrs Queen Takes the Train, and The Silver Linings Playbook.

Saint Mazie


Jami Attenberg - 2015
    It's the Jazz Age, with romance and booze aplenty--even when Prohibition kicks in--and Mazie never turns down a night on the town. But her high spirits mask a childhood rooted in poverty, and her diary, always close at hand, holds her dearest secrets.When the Great Depression hits, Mazie's life is on the brink of transformation. Addicts and bums roam the Bowery; homelessness is rampant. If Mazie won't help them, then who? When she opens the doors of The Venice to those in need, this ticket-taking, fun-time girl becomes the beating heart of the Lower East Side, and in defining one neighborhood helps define the city.Then, more than ninety years after Mazie began her diary, it's discovered by a documentarian in search of a good story. Who was Mazie Phillips, really? A chorus of voices from the past and present fill in some of the mysterious blanks of her adventurous life.Inspired by the life of a woman who was profiled in Joseph Mitchell's classic Up in the Old Hotel, Saint Mazie is infused with Jami Attenberg's signature wit, bravery, and heart. Mazie's rise to "sainthood"--and her irrepressible spirit--is unforgettable.

The Boy Vanishes


Jennifer Haigh - 2012
    Taut and powerful, it is a keen reimagining of a whodunit in which everyone is implicated and no one is safe. It’s the summer of 1976 on the South Shore of Massachusetts. The Bicentennial is a season-long celebration, and flags are everywhere, snapping in the seaside winds, ironed onto T-shirts, tattooed into biceps. Tim O’Connor works the Cigarette Game booth at Funland—toss a quarter placed on an eight-sided ball into the right slot and you win two packs of smokes or maybe, if you’re lucky, a carton. If asked his age, he’d say he’s seventeen, but in truth he’s fourteen. Yet the kids in blue-collar Grantham—a town first imagined by Haigh in her devastating bestseller "Faith"—grow up fast, are known for being wild, and more often than not drop out of school to punch the clock at the nearby Raytheon plant. When Tim disappears after the park’s closing one night, no one makes much of it till late morning. It’s not the first time his mother, Kay, has forgotten to pick him up. It’s not the first time he has stayed out all night. By the time local cops begin their investigation, there is little trace of the boy, only witnesses to a complicated set of relationships in a place where surviving isn’t always thriving and where disappointment mixes with the salt in the air. In this superbly crafted story, the search for a missing boy becomes a search for the American dream, laying bare how destructive its promises often are. Recalling Dennis Lehane in setting and subject and masters like Graham Greene and Richard Ford in tone and style, Haigh’s latest work is a testament to all that short fiction can be. It’s a searing portrait of how much a community loses when one of its own is lost.