Azadi


Arundhati Roy - 2020
    Ironically, it also became the chant of millions on the streets of India against the project of Hindu Nationalism.Even as Arundhati Roy began to ask what lay between these two calls for Freedom—a chasm or a bridge?—the streets fell silent. Not only in India, but all over the world. The coronavirus brought with it another, more terrible understanding of Azadi, making a nonsense of international borders, incarcerating whole populations, and bringing the modern world to a halt like nothing else ever could.In this series of electrifying essays, Arundhati Roy challenges us to reflect on the meaning of freedom in a world of growing authoritarianism.The essays include meditations on language, public as well as private, and on the role of fiction and alternative imaginations in these disturbing times.The pandemic, she says, is a portal between one world and another. For all the illness and devastation it has left in its wake, it is an invitation to the human race, an opportunity, to imagine another world.

When Nietzsche Wept by Irvin D. Yalom Summary & Study Guide


BookRags - 2011
    38 pages of chapter summaries, quotes, character analysis, themes, and more – everything you need to sharpen your knowledge of When Nietzsche Wept. This detailed literature summary also contains Topics for Discussion and a Free Quiz on When Nietzsche Wept by Irvin D. Yalom.

Vampire Diaries Collection: 8 Titles in 6 Books


L.J. Smith
    Time Bestselling Author In New YorkVampire Diaries Story 8 Titles in 6 BooksTitles in This SetThe Awakening + The Struggle, The Fury + The Reunion, Nightfall, Shadow Souls, The Return: Midnight, Phantom.

I'm the King of the Castle


Susan Hill - 1970
    Nevertheless Charles Kingshaw and his mother are soon installed and Edmund sets about persecuting his fearful new playmate.From the dusty back rooms of Warings through the gloomy labyrinth of Hang Wood to the very top of Leydell Castle, Edmund pursues Charles, the balance of power slipping back and forth between bully and victim. With their parents oblivious, the situation speeds towards a crisis...Darkly claustrophobic and morally ambiguous, Susan Hill weaves a classic tale of cruelty, power, and the dangerous games we play as children.'A brilliant tour de force' Guardian'Equalled for poignancy and horror only in Lord of the Flies' Sunday Telegraph'Delves beneath the surface of complex young minds, exposing not only their vulnerabilty and tenderness, their cruelty and malevolence, but also how parents end up turning a blind eye to their pain' Anita Sethi

The Hotel Eden


Ron Carlson - 1997
    In "Zanduce at Second, " a baseball player turned killer-by-accident undergoes a surprising transformation. We root for escaped felon Ray ("A Note on the Type") as he carves his name on a culvert wall. We drive through the sweltering summer streets of Phoenix as a nineteen-year-old narrator goes through an unsettling sexual awakening ("Oxygen"). In these and other stories, whether his characters are getting sabotaged by nightcaps or encountering nudists on a rafting trip, Ron Carlson takes us to a generous array of places in a new way. Finally, in "The Chromium Hook, " he takes us to a lovers' lane where he solves an ancient mystery. Carlson's work has always made a difference. His men and women are resourceful creatures, driven and derided by conscience, comforted by the possibility of love, and at all times ready for the next thing.

Memoir of the Hawk


James Tate - 2001
    In the privacy of their homes, who can save them from themselves? In the forests and hills and on the beautiful lakes, what could possibly be wrong? Even in the sweet hometown, with its kindly police, menace lurks in a thousand disguises. Mystery and magic surround this metropolis of the imagination. Once again, James Tate has given us a world of surprising pleasures:... lost in the interstellar space between teacups in the cupboard, found in the beak of a downy woodpecker, the lovers staring into the void and then jumping over it, flying into their beautiful tomorrows like the heroes of a storm.

Ruth


Lois T. Henderson - 1981
    A girl who lost her husband but found love again. A girl who wouldn't turn her back on her new found Faith, though many rejected her.This is her story. Ruth.

The Sisters of the Winter Wood


Rena Rossner - 2018
    When their parents travel to visit their dying grandfather, the sisters are left behind in their home in the woods.But before they leave, Liba discovers the secret that their Tati can transform into a bear, and their Mami into a swan. Perhaps, Liba realizes, the old fairy tales are true. She must guard this secret carefully, even from her beloved sister.Soon a troupe of mysterious men appear in town and Laya falls under their spell-despite their mother's warning to be wary of strangers. And these are not the only dangers lurking in the woods...The sisters will need each other if they are to become the women they need to be - and save their people from the dark forces that draw closer.

Tinder


Sally Gardner - 2013
    A half beast half man gives him shoes and dice which will lead him deep into a web of dark magic and mystery. He meets the beautiful Safire - pure of heart and spirit, the scheming Mistress Jabber and the terrifying Lady of the Nail. He learns the powers of the tinderbox and the wolves whose master he becomes. But will all the riches in the world bring him the thing he most desires?Fairy tales are often the cruellest stories of all; in this exquisite novel Sally Gardner writes about great love and great loss.

Dorian


Will Self - 2002
    It is "an age in which appearances matter more and more and more. Only the shallowest of people won't judge by them."

Eleanor, or, The Rejection of the Progress of Love


Anna Moschovakis - 2018
    From Brooklyn to Madison to Ethiopia, Eleanor's slow trek toward a kind of autonomy after her laptop (and her data) are stolen, and the narrator's struggle for authority as she wrestles with her novel and a very famous critic's opinion of it, form a series of intersections of experience, exposure, and self-knowledge, occuring on axes of both will and happenstance: not just the backdrop but the material of the work at hand.

The Revenants


Sheri S. Tepper - 1984
    Thewson of the Lion Courts. Leona, Queen of the Beasts. Medlo, outlawes Prince. Jasmine the Dancer. Terascouros the Singer. And young Jaer, whose like has never been seen: Jaer, the greatest riddle of all. They are the Revenants. This is their story.

The 10th Kingdom


Kathryn Wesley - 2000
    Welcome to THE 10TH KINGDOM.   Suppose you were on your way to work. Not a great job, just one that pays the bills. And suddenly, you are in the middle of a fantastic adventure and running for your life.   You don't believe it could happen? Well, it could, and in THE 10TH KINGDOM, it does.   Embark on an odyssey that will grip your imagination, steal your heart - and leave you spellbound as only the very best story can.   Virginia and Tony, a father and daughter from New York, unwittingly find themselves in a parallel universe known as The Nine Kingdoms where they must join forces with a schizophrenic man-wolf and Prince, a handsome golden retriever (formally known as Prince Wendell, grandson of Snow White until his wicked stepmother turned him into a dog). The unlikely heroes then embark on an epic quest to save Prince from the evil Queen and restore him to the throne.Includes 16 pages of full-color plate images from the television mini-series.

Gallery Pieces: An Art Mystery


Larry Witham - 2016
    Formerly in Navy intelligence, he’s cast his lot in the New York art world. He’s landed a job with the venerable Medici Studios, which also contracts with the NYPD and FBI. On a winter morning, they’ve run a sting operation to track Russian art smugglers. The caper goes awry, but an odd bit of evidence remains: four art catalogs with graffiti markings.So begins Gallery Pieces, a story that will keep readers guessing until the end. Peale follows the clues where they lead. He meets a heavy at the Miami Art Fair, chases a mystery bidder at Merriweather’s auction in Manhattan, and crosses paths with a Brooklyn performance artist whose pranks are dangerously entangled in the Russian intrigues. Step by step, Peale enters an art world permeated not only by the avant-garde, but by the Russian mob, hackers, forgers, hipsters, and the history of art looting in Europe during WWII.When Peale least expects it, the catalogs lead him on another trail. He is drawn into a long-forgotten mystery surrounding his grandfather, Maxwell Peale, who had been a “monuments man,” a soldier who helped reclaim art looted by the Nazis. Peale is on his way to discovering paintings stolen in postwar Europe. Finding the culprits, however, brings him closer to home than he’d imagined.

Stories to Get You Through the Night


Helen DunmoreJames Lasdun - 2010
    Inside you will find writing from the greatest of classic and contemporary authors; stories that will brighten and inspire, move and delight, soothe and restore in equal measure.This is an anthology to devour or to savour at your leisure, each story a perfectly imagined whole to be read and reread, and each a journey to transport the reader away from the everyday. Immersed in the pages you will follow lovers to midnight trysts, accompany old friends on new adventures, be thrilled by ghostly delights, overcome heartbreak, loss and longing, and be warmed by tales of redemption, and of hope and happiness.Whether as a cure for insomnia, to while away the hours on a midnight journey, or as a brief moment of escapism before you turn in, the stories contained in this remarkable collection provide the perfect antidote to the frenetic pace of modern life - a rich and calming selection guaranteed to see you through the night.Featuring stories by:Katherine Mansfield, Alice Munro, Anton Chekhov, Oscar Wilde, Haruki Murakami, Wilkie Collins, Kate Chopin, Elizabeth Gaskell, The Brothers Grimm, John Cheever, Arthur Conan Doyle, Virginia Woolf, Rudyard Kipling, Helen Simpson, Richard Yates, James Lasdun, Martin Amis, Angela Carter, Somerset Maugham and Julian Barnes