Book picks similar to
The Inconvenience of the Wings by Silas Dent Zobal
short-stories
birds
cant-find
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Jon
George Saunders - 2003
They fall in love, Carolyn becomes pregnant, and they request to exit the facility.... Josh squeezed through the little gap between the…
Julieta: Three Stories That Inspired the Movie
Alice Munro - 2016
In these three linked stories, “Chance,” “Soon,” and “Silence”—which, together, inspired Pedro Almodóvar’s film Julieta—her virtuosic talents are once again on display. The stories follow a schoolteacher named Juliet as she is swept up by fate: meeting an older man on a train and starting an affair; later, visiting her parents as a young mother; and later still, searching for contact with her estranged daughter. As with all of Munro’s characters, Juliet radiates warmth, dignity, and hope, even as she is unflinching in the face of betrayal and loss. In Munro’s hands, her journey is as surprising, extraordinary, and precious as life itself.From the Trade Paperback edition.
A Voice in the Night
Jack McDevitt - 2018
Jack encountered Gilbert Chesterton’s Father Brown tales a few years later and they ultimately became the prime influence in his science fiction. The issue with Father Brown was never a question of who committed the murder, but rather what in heaven’s name is going on here? Why does an astronaut, in “Cathedral,” sacrifice her life to collide with an asteroid that she knows poses no threat to the Earth? Why does a scientist who’s designed an actual working AI in “The Play’s the Thing,” hide what’s he’s done? How is it that the lives of two people working at Moonbase in “Blinker” depend on a quasar? In “Lucy,” Jack shows us why sending automated vehicles to explore the distant outposts of the solar system may not be a good idea. And in “Searching for Oz,” an alternate history story, how things might have been if SETI had gotten what it was looking for. He describes our reaction in “Listen Up, Nitwits,” when a voice begins speaking to us, apparently from Jupiter, in Greek. And in “The Lost Equation,” a Holmes adventure, we discover who really was first to arrive at e=mc2. Jack also provides two episodes, “Maiden Voyage” and “Waiting At the Altar,” from Priscilla Hutchins’ qualification flight; and an effort by a sixteen-year-old Alex Benedict, in the title story with his uncle Gabe and Chase Kolpath’s mom, Tori, who are trying to understand why a brilliant radio entertainer, lost in the stars when his drive unit suffered a malfunction, never said goodbye. These and fourteen other rides into odd places await the reader.
McSweeney's #43
Dave Eggers - 2013
There have been hardcovers and paperbacks, an issue with two spines, an issue with a magnetic binding, an issue that looked like a bundle of junk mail, and an issue that looked like a sweaty human head. McSweeney’s has won multiple literary awards, including two National Magazine Awards for fiction, and has had numerous stories appear in The Best American Magazine Writing, the O. Henry Awards anthologies, and The Best American Short Stories. Design awards given to the quarterly include the AIGA 50 Books Award, the AIGA 365 Illustration Award, and the Print Design Regional Award.
Stones in the Road
E.B. Moore - 2015
Growing up among the Pennsylvania Amish, eleven-year-old Joshua knows that his father is a respected church deacon who has the ear of God. But he’s also seen his father’s weakness for drink, and borne the brunt of his violent rages. In the aftermath of a disastrous fire, Joshua fears his father’s reprimand enough to run away from home. Having never experienced the ways of the English, Joshua now embarks on a decade-long journey to California, where he’s heard it’s always summer.His mother, Miriam, is forced to take on the unusual role of head of the family when her husband is unable to recover physically, emotionally, or spiritually from the fire. As mother and son each find themselves in uncharted territory, they must draw on strength and forgiveness from within. Urged by everyone to accept her son’s death, Miriam never gives up hope of seeing Joshua again. But even as her prayers are answered so many years later, Joshua’s reunion will require him to face his father once again…READERS GUIDE INCLUDED
Benito Cereno, Bartleby: The Scrivener, and The Encantadas
Herman Melville - 1855
Considered to be one of Melville's best short stories, "Benito Cereno" is a tale of the revolt aboard a Spanish ship. "Bartleby: The Scrivener" is a moral allegory set on Wall Street in New York. And "The Encantadas" are a collection of sketches based on Melville's experiences in the Galapagos Islands.
We Live Inside Your Eyes
Kealan Patrick Burke - 2019
To anyone else, the remains of the woman with the goat skull head is a warning. To a lonely young boy looking for escape, it is a god of salvation. At its feet lay tattered old notebooks, scattered stories, tales of strange encounters, of broken people and monstrous things, and of corrupt hearts and evil minds. In order to complete his transfiguration, the boy must read these stories, but he has no idea the fate that awaits him.WE LIVE INSIDE YOUR EYES is the much anticipated new collection from Bram Stoker Award-winning horror author Kealan Patrick Burke, featuring previously uncollected stories and two brand new tales written especially for this collection, the short story "You Have Nothing to Fear From Me", and the novelette "The House on Abigail Lane." With story notes by the author.
This is What It Means to Say Phoenix, Arizona
Sherman Alexie - 1993
Merlin Dreams In The Mondream Wood
Charles de Lint - 1992
collected in Spiritwalk
Cantonese Love Stories: Twenty-Five Vignettes of a City
Dung Kai-cheung - 2017
Two lovers ruminate on the power of their photo booth stickers to keep them together. Peach-pocket Girl reads stolen love letters at a café. Pui Pui knows a Portuguese egg tart is authentic if she dreams of riding a boat-like egg tart. Each character inhabits a different corner of Hong Kong’s dreamscape; together they bring to life Dung Kai-cheung’s imaginative vision of the city.
The Old Equations
Jake Kerr - 2011
They knew it would be difficult, but they weren't prepared for the cruelty of the unknown. Coming to terms with new equations and ways of looking at the future is difficult enough, but can any relationship prevail when the only tie to the present starts to break down? "An astonishing debut." -- John Joseph Adams, host, Geeks Guide to the Galaxy This debut novelette by Jake Kerr is a modern classic of science fiction. Nominated for the Nebula Award, the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award, and the StorySouth Million Writers Award, it immediately established Kerr as a modern force in science fiction's humanist tradition. "Heartwrenching." SF Revu
Because I Wanted to Write You a Pop Song
Kara Vernor - 2016
They pine for lost loves and pop music romances, Hollywood heartthrobs, and sunnier towns. They flee from failed relationships and looming violence, adulthood and other deaths. Written with dark humor and incisive, voice-driven prose, Kara Vernor's stories will stick in your head like a song. "Kara Vernor's "Because I Wanted To Write You A Pop Song" is hilarious, dark, and beguiling. These wonderful stories crackle with hard-earned wisdom and wit and will, like all the very best songs, become forever etched on your heart." --John Jodzio, author of Knockout "Reading Kara Vernor is like being in a fast car that reveals the deepest secrets of its passerby. You rubberneck and yearn for more. You're spinning, you're flying, you're exhilarated and sad and brimming with thrill. Hail this book and hold on tight." --Lindsay Hunter, author of Ugly Girls "Kara Vernor says so much in so few words with these stories that I felt myself becoming a better reader as I read them. Her writing feels like a knife, cutting through so many of the falsehoods of American life and leaving only the truth, somehow leaving it both gently and determinedly at the same time. The stories in Because I Wanted to Write You a Pop Song do not flinch and do not seem to even remember how." --Siamak Vossoughi, author of Better Than War (winner of the Flannery O'Connor Award for Short Fiction) "The stories in "Because I Wanted to Write You a Pop Song" dazzle and tenderize. They are strange little worlds that invite you in...Kara Vernor writes with gut, heart, and striking beauty." --Jensen Beach, author of Swallowed by the Cold "If I could leave a few things in a capsule for the civilization coming next, I think I’d maybe pick Kara Vernor’s stories. Beings of the future might know us that way: how we thought; how our words arranged themselves on our tongues when we were only half thinking; what we were after, and how messed up that all was, but how vital in a deeper way. Like some of my favorite writers, Vernor is able to bring to the page a voice you’re shocked to recognize, for it seems so totally new. All of the stars, is what I’m trying to say. All of the hearts and cherries."--Scott Garson, author of Is That You, John Wayne?
Minefield
Andy Maslen - 2018
By a freakish stroke of good fortune, Win Yah dodges the bullet that would have exploded his skull. Wounded by a mine, Eli is captured, brutally beaten and taken into the forest to be executed. Gabriel must find her, evade recapture by the warlord’s heavily-armed gang, and get her to safety. Only then can he return to finish what Eli started. This 25,000 word novella from best-selling thriller author Andy Maslen kicks off with high-powered action and doesn’t let up until the final page. Mines litter the forest - and the plot - causing trouble for everyone who wanders off the path. How you’re helping Cambodia’s poorest children get a decent start in life Andy wrote Minefield after visiting a rural school in northern Cambodia, whose grounds were carved out of a minefield. He is donating all royalties from the book to the Ponheary Ly Foundation (PLF). The PLF was set up by Ponheary Ly, herself a survivor of the Cambodian genocide. It gives vulnerable children an education, as well as a full belly and a real chance of making the most of their potential.
The Slow Sad Suicide of Rohan Wijeratne
Yudhanjaya Wijeratne - 2017
You?Alcoholic, said Rohan.Sixteen light-years from Earth, a black hole spins in the darkness, gravity and rotation flattening it into a Kerr singularity. In Colombo, Sri Lanka, a suicidal alcoholic signs up for the ultimate one-way trip: to be frozen, sent light years away from home, and shot into the black hole itself.