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books tagged “contemporary”
books tagged “contemporary”
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The Age of Innocenceby Edith WhartonISBN 1568495854 (1-56849-585-4)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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Airportby Arthur HaileyISBN 1568495625 (1-56849-562-5)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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Anastasia Syndrome and Other Storiesby Mary Higgins ClarkISBN 1568490739 (1-56849-073-9)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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The Anti-Aesthetic: Essays on Postmodern Cultureby Hal FosterISBN 1565847423 (1-56584-742-3)
Softcover, New Pr
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Anti-Aesthetic: Essays on Postmodern Culture'Book summary:For the past few decades Hal Foster's critical gaze has encompassed the increasingly complex machinery of the culture industry. His observations push the boundaries of cultural criticism to establish a vantage point from which the seemingly disparate agendas of artists, patrons, and critics have a telling coherence. The Anti-Aesthetic is a touchstone volume for postmodern debate and theory. Though the cultural stakes and terms have changed over the last decade, this collection still illuminates--perhaps now even more lucidly--a vital current in contemporary criticism. Contributors: Jean Baudrillard, Douglas Crimp, Kenneth Frampton, Jrgen Habermas, Fredric Jameson, Rosalind Krauss, Craig Owens, Edward Said, and Gregory Ulmer. [via]
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At the Wall of the Almightyby Farnoosh MoshiriISBN 1566563151 (1-56656-315-1)
Softcover, Interlink Pub Group Inc
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Back to Earth: Tomorrow's Environmentalismby Anthony WestonISBN 1566392373 (1-56639-237-3)
Softcover, Temple Univ Pr
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Beyond the Worship Wars: Building Vital and Faithful Worshipby Thomas G. LongISBN 1566992400 (1-56699-240-0)
Softcover, Alban Inst
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The Bird Artistby Howard NormanISBN 1568950942 (1-56895-094-2)
Softcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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Black Elk Speaksby John G. NeihardtISBN 1567311113 (1-56731-111-3)
Hardcover, Fine Communications
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Black Elk Speaks'Book summary:The most famous Native American book ever written, Black Elk Speaks is the acclaimed story of Lakota visionary and healer Nicholas Black Elk (18631950) and his people during the momentous, twilight years of the nineteenth century. Black Elk grew up in a time when white settlers were invading the Lakotas homeland, decimating buffalo herds and threatening to extinguish their way of life. Black Elk and other Lakotas fought back, a dogged resistance that resulted in a remarkable victory at the Little Bighorn and an unspeakable tragedy at Wounded Knee.[via]Beautifully told through the celebrated poet and writer John G. Neihardt, Black Elk Speaks offers much more than a life story. Black Elks profound and arresting religious visions of the unity of humanity and the world around him have transformed his account into a venerated spiritual classic. Whether appreciated as a collaborative autobiography, a history of a Native American nation, or an enduring spiritual testament for all humankind, Black Elk Speaks is unforgettable.
This special edition features all three prefaces to Black Elk Speaks that John G. Neihardt wrote at different points in his life, a map of Black Elks world, a reset text with Lakota words reproduced using the latest orthographic standards, and color paintings by Lakota artist Standing Bear that have not been widely available for decades.
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Black Sun: A Novelby Edward AbbeyISBN 1568490828 (1-56849-082-8)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books, Incorporated
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The Book of Guysby Garrison KeillorISBN 1568950659 (1-56895-065-9)
Hardcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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The Buccaneersby Edith Wharton, Marion MainwaringISBN 1568950624 (1-56895-062-4)
Hardcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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Cardinal's Sinby Raymond BucklandISBN 1567181023 (1-56718-102-3)
Softcover, Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd
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Casino Royale: Library Editionby Ian FlemingISBN 1567310567 (1-56731-056-7)
Hardcover, Fine Communications
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Casino Royale: Library Edition'Book summary:The licence to kill for the Secret Service was a great honour. It brought James Bond the only assignments he enjoyed, the dangerous ones. At the Casino in Deauville, Bond's game is baccarat. But away from the discreet salons, the caviar and champagne, it's 007 versus one of Russia's most powerful and ruthless agents. [via]
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Clay's Quiltby Silas HouseISBN 1565123077 (1-56512-307-7)
Hardcover, Workman Pub Co
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The Color Purpleby Alice WalkerISBN 1568496281 (1-56849-628-1)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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The Committeeby Raymond BucklandISBN 1567181007 (1-56718-100-7)
Softcover, Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd
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Congoby Michael CrichtonISBN 1568491263 (1-56849-126-3)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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Dream Boyby Jim GrimsleyISBN 1565121066 (1-56512-106-6)
Hardcover, Algonquin Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Dream Boy'Book summary:ALA Gay-Lesbian-Bisexual Book Award. DREAM BOY confirms the immense promise of Jim Grimsley's award-winning debut, WINTER BIRDS. In his electrifying novel, adolescent gay love, violence, and the spirituality of old-time religion are combined through the alchemy of Grimsley's vision into a powerfully suspenseful story of escape and redemption. "I've never read a novel remotely like DREAM BOY; and my admiration for Jim Grimsley's power is widened and deepened."--Reynolds Price; "Translucent prose and emotional authenticity."--Out. A QUALITY PAPERBACK BOOK CLUB SELECTION. [via]
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Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritanceby Barack ObamaISBN 1568361629 (1-56836-162-9)
Softcover, Kodansha Amer Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance'Book summary:The son of a black African and a white American, the author traces the history of his parents' migrations, his own odyssey from Africa to America and back, and his journey of self-discovery, spanning racial divides, continents, and generations. Reprint. [via]
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Ecological Politics: Ecofeminists and the Greensby Greta GaardISBN 1566395690 (1-56639-569-0)
Hardcover, Temple Univ Pr
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Empire of the Sunby J.G. BallardISBN 156849663X (1-56849-663-X)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Empire of the Sun'Book summary:From the creators of the movie tie-in blockbusteries, The Color Purple, comes the most certain money-making event of this winter. Empire of the Sun is the story of a young boy in Shanghai who witnesses the outbreak of World War II and the bombing of Nagasaki. [via]
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The Evil B.B. Chow And Other Storiesby Steve AlmondISBN 1565125290 (1-56512-529-0)
Softcover, Workman Pub Co
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Family Blessingsby Spencer LavyrleISBN 1568950616 (1-56895-061-6)
Hardcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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Gap Creek: Library Editionby Robert MorganISBN 1565122968 (1-56512-296-8)
Hardcover, Algonquin Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Gap Creek: Library Edition'Book summary:Oprah Book Club® Selection, January 2000: Robert Morgan's Gap Creek opens with one wrenching death and ends with another. In between, this novel of turn-of-the-century Appalachian life works in fire, flood, swindlers, sickness, and starvation--a truly biblical assortment of plagues, all visited on the sturdy shoulders of 17-year-old Julie Harmon. "Human life don't mean a thing in this world," she concludes. And who could blame her? "People could be born and they could suffer, and they could die, and it didn't mean a thing.... The world was exactly like it had been and would always be, going on about its business." For Julie, that business is hard physical labor. Fortunately, she's fully capable of working "like a man"--splitting and hauling wood, butchering hogs, rendering lard, planting crops, and taking care of the stock. Even when Julie meets and marries handsome young Hank Richards, there's no happily-ever-after in store. Nothing comes easy in Julie Harmon's world, and their first year together is no exception.
Throughout the novel, Morgan chronicles Julie's trials in prose of great dignity and clarity, capturing the rhythms of North Carolina speech by using only the subtlest of inflections. Clearly the author has done his research too--the descriptions of physical labor practically leap off the page. (Suffice to say, you'll learn far more about hog slaughtering than you ever dreamed of knowing.) Yet he resists the temptation to make his long-suffering characters into saints. Julie simmers with resentment at being her family's workhorse, and Hank flies into a helpless rage whenever he feels that his authority is questioned. In novels like The Truest Pleasure and The Hinterlands, Morgan proved his ability to create memorable heroines. In Gap Creek, he writes with great feeling--but not a touch of sentimentality--about a life Julie aptly calls "both simple and hard." [via]
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Gold Rushby Miri Yu, Stephen SnyderISBN 1566492831 (1-56649-283-1)
Softcover, Welcome Rain
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Gold Rushby Stephen Snyder, Miri YuISBN 156649155X (1-56649-155-X)
Hardcover, Welcome Rain
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Half Asleep in Frog Pajamasby Tom RobbinsISBN 1568950918 (1-56895-091-8)
Softcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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Hero With A Thousand Facesby Joseph CampbellISBN 1567311202 (1-56731-120-2)
Hardcover, Fine Communications
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Hero With A Thousand Faces'Book summary:Originally written by Campbell in the '40s-- in his pre-Bill Moyers days -- and famous as George Lucas' inspiration for "Star Wars," this book will likewise inspire any writer or reader in its well considered assertion that while all stories have already been told, this is *not* a bad thing, since the *retelling* is still necessary. And while our own life's journey must always be ended alone, the travel is undertaken in the company not only of immediate loved ones and primal passion, but of the heroes and heroines -- and myth-cycles -- that have preceded us. [via]
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The Hero's Walk: A Novelby Anita Rau BadamiISBN 1565123123 (1-56512-312-3)
Hardcover, Algonquin Books
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Homingby Elswyth ThaneISBN 1568494793 (1-56849-479-3)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Homing'Book summary:Volume 7 of The Williamsburg Series [via]
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I Want to Buy a Vowelby John WelterISBN 156512118X (1-56512-118-X)
Hardcover, Workman Pub Co
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I'll Be Seeing Youby Mary Higgins ClarkISBN 1568496036 (1-56849-603-6)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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The Illuminatus Trilogyby Robert Shea, Robert Anton WilsonISBN 1567312373 (1-56731-237-3)
Hardcover, Fine Communications
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Illuminatus Trilogy'Book summary:Filled with sex and violence--in and out of time and space--the three books of The Illuminatus are only partly works of the imagination. They tackle all the coverups of our time--from who really shot the Kennedys to why there's a pyramid on a one-dollar bill.
From the Trade Paperback edition. [via]More editions of The Illuminatus Trilogy:
In Cold Bloodby Truman CapoteISBN 1568491522 (1-56849-152-2)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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In the Land of Second Chancesby George ShaffnerISBN 1565124405 (1-56512-440-5)
Hardcover, Algonquin Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'In the Land of Second Chances'Book summary:Meet Wilma Porter, the plucky and kindhearted owner of the only bed and breakfast in Ebb, Nebraska. Wilma knows everybody in town and everybody is in a bit of trouble. No one more so than Calvin Millet, though. His wife has up and left him and their ailing daughter. His department store is close to bankruptcy. His house has been destroyed by a tornado. The folks of Ebb, including Wilma and her indomitable gang of friends, watch Calvin's fortunes wane with great dismay, for in Ebb, everyone's fate is connected to his.
When a handsome stranger named Vernon L. Moore comes to town selling games of chance, more than a few eyebrows are raised. A consummate salesman, he befriends the troubled townspeople one by one. He listens to their stories and asks them intriguing questions that make them see their situations differently. The father of a dying child, the reclusive widow who's taken permanent board at the B & B, the banker with ulterior motives, and the outspoken Wilma Porter are all changed by their encounters with this mysterious man who seems not of this world. After all, no one has seen a traveling salesman in Ebb for more than thirty years. But wherever he's from and whoever he is, he leaves behind a town where second chances are not only possible, they canand dohappen. [via]More editions of In the Land of Second Chances:
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In the Time of the Butterfliesby Julia AlvarezISBN 1565120388 (1-56512-038-8)
Hardcover, Algonquin Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'In the Time of the Butterflies'Book summary:From the author of How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents comes this tale of courage and sisterhood set in the Dominican Republic during the rise of the Trujillo dictatorship. A skillful blend of fact and fiction, In the Time of the Butterflies is inspired by the true story of the three Mirabal sisters who, in 1960, were murdered for their part in an underground plot to overthrow the government. Alvarez breathes life into these historical figures--known as "las mariposas," or "the butterflies," in the underground--as she imagines their teenage years, their gradual involvement with the revolution, and their terror as their dissentience is uncovered.
Alvarez's controlled writing perfectly captures the mounting tension as "the butterflies" near their horrific end. The novel begins with the recollections of Dede, the fourth and surviving sister, who fears abandoning her routines and her husband to join the movement. Alvarez also offers the perspectives of the other sisters: brave and outspoken Minerva, the family's political ringleader; pious Patria, who forsakes her faith to join her sisters after witnessing the atrocities of the tyranny; and the baby sister, sensitive Maria Teresa, who, in a series of diaries, chronicles her allegiance to Minerva and the physical and spiritual anguish of prison life.
In the Time of the Butterflies is an American Library Association Notable Book and a 1995 National Book Critics Circle Award nominee. [via]
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The Journalistby Harry MathewsISBN 1567920071 (1-56792-007-1)
Hardcover, David R Godine Pub
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The Jungleby Upton Beall SinclairISBN 1566195667 (1-56619-566-7)
Softcover, Barnes & Noble Imports
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Jungle'Book summary:The Jungle By Upton Sinclair [via]
Kings of Albionby Julian RathboneISBN 1566492866 (1-56649-286-6)
Softcover, Welcome Rain
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Kings of Albion'Book summary:In this work Julian Rathbone deftly employs the eyes of outside observers to shape a witty and often profound view of how the English came to be the way that they are. Throroughly modern, richly descriptive, packed with action, savage and erotic, informed with a spirit of inquiry and speculation that lifts it far above the conventional history novel, Kings of Albion is sure to please many discerning readers. [via]
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Letters to a Young Poet/the Possibility of Beingby Rainer Maria RilkeISBN 1567315208 (1-56731-520-8)
Hardcover, Fine Communications
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Letters to a Young Poet/the Possibility of Being'Book summary:Letters To A Young Poet... The Possibility of Being. By Rainer Maria Rilke. Two complete works. [via]
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Lincolnby Gore VidalISBN 1568496265 (1-56849-626-5)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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The Lottery Winner: Alvirah and Willy Storiesby Mary Higgins ClarkISBN 1568495889 (1-56849-588-9)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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The Loved Oneby Evelyn WaughISBN 1568493584 (1-56849-358-4)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books, Incorporated
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The Metamorphosis and Other Storiesby Franz KafkaISBN 1566199697 (1-56619-969-7)
Softcover, Barnes & Noble Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Metamorphosis and Other Stories'Book summary:This collection of new translations brings together the small proportion of Kafka's works that he thought worthy of publication. It includes "Metamorphosis", his most famous work, an exploration of horrific transformation and alienation; "Meditation", a collection of his earlier studies; "The Judgement", written in a single night of frenzied creativity; "The Stoker", the first chapter of a novel set in America and a fascinating occasional piece, "The Aeroplanes at Brescia", Kafka's eyewitness account of an air display in 1909. Together, these stories reveal the breadth of Kafka's literary vision and the extraordinary imaginative depth of his thought. [via]
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Missing Josephby Elizabeth GeorgeISBN 1568950381 (1-56895-038-1)
Hardcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Missing Joseph'Book summary:When Deborah St James hears of the unexpected death of Reverend Sage, her sadness has a very personal tinge. For their paths had crossed some months earlier at a particularly vulnerable time for Deborah, and she had found herself confessing her intimate anguish to this sympathetic stranger. When she realizes that his death is far from accidental, Deborah, with her husband, Simon, enlists the help of Inspector Lynley, and the trio embark upon an investigation that hinges upon the overriding - and ultimately destructive - power of parental love. [via]
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The Monkey Wrench Gangby Edward AbbeyISBN 1568490836 (1-56849-083-6)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books, Incorporated
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Monkey Wrench Gang'Book summary:Ed Abbey called The Monkey Wrench Gang, his 1975 novel, a "comic extravaganza." Some readers have remarked that the book is more a comic book than a real novel, and it's true that reading this incendiary call to protect the American wilderness requires more than a little of the old willing suspension of disbelief. The story centers on Vietnam veteran George Washington Hayduke III, who returns to the desert to find his beloved canyons and rivers threatened by industrial development. On a rafting trip down the Colorado River, Hayduke joins forces with feminist saboteur Bonnie Abbzug, wilderness guide Seldom Seen Smith, and billboard torcher Doc Sarvis, M.D., and together they wander off to wage war on the big yellow machines, on dam builders and road builders and strip miners. As they do, his characters voice Abbey's concerns about wilderness preservation ("Hell of a place to lose a cow," Smith thinks to himself while roaming through the canyonlands of southern Utah. "Hell of a place to lose your heart. Hell of a place... to lose. Period"). Moving from one improbable situation to the next, packing more adventure into the space of a few weeks than most real people do in a lifetime, the motley gang puts fear into the hearts of their enemies, laughing all the while. It's comic, yes, and required reading for anyone who has come to love the desert. --Gregory McNamee [via]
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My Phantom Husbandby Esther Allen, Marie DarrieussecqISBN 1565845382 (1-56584-538-2)
Hardcover, W W Norton & Co Inc
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Once and Alwaysby Judith McNaughtISBN 1568950411 (1-56895-041-1)
Hardcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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Outwitting History: The Amazing Adventures of A Man Who Rescued A Million Yiddish Booksby Aaron LanskyISBN 1565125134 (1-56512-513-4)
Softcover, Algonquin Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Outwitting History: The Amazing Adventures of a Man Who Rescued a Million Yiddish Books'Book summary:The great Yiddish scholar Max Weinreich was delivering a lecture in Finland when the Nazis invaded his native Poland. The lecture saved his life. He made his way to New York, where he opened his doors to new students. Many thought his work was hopelessespecialy since half of the world's Yiddish speakers had been killed in the Holocaust. Asked why he persevered, Weinreich answered simply: "Because Yiddish has magic, it will outwit history."
And so it hasthough in ways few could have imagined. In 1980, a twenty-three-year-old student named Aaron Lanksy set out to rescue the world's abandoned Yiddish books before it was too late. Precious volumes that had survived Hitler and Stalin were being passed down from older generations of Jewish immigrants to their non-Yiddish-speaking childrenonly to be thrown away or destroyed. With little more than his own chutzpah, Lansky issued a worldwide appeal for unwanted Yiddish books, and the response was overwhelming.
Outwitting History is an adventure tale filled with unforgettable characters and told with the exuberance of a man whose passion led him from house to house, country to country, collecting treasured books and heartfelt, often hilarious stories of the vibrant intellectual world these older Jews inhabited. Lansky and a team of young volunteers crisscrossed America, shlepping books from attics and basements, demolition sites and Dumpsters, while shmoozing with their owners, who insisted on feeding them a little noshgefilte fish, kasha, blintzes, latkes, kugelbefore handing over, one book at a time, their beloved literary history.
When Lansky started out, experts believed that fewer than 70,000 Yiddish-language books still existed. Twenty-five years and 1.5 million books later, the organization Lansky founded, the National Yiddish Book Center, is one of the largest and fastest-growing Jewish cultural groups in the world. As he takes us along on his groundbreaking journey, Lansky explores the roots of the Yiddish language and introduces us to the brilliant Yiddish writersfrom Mendele to Sholem Aleichem to I.B. Singerwhose lasting cultural relevance is evident on every page. He shares the humor, tenacity, and love for the written word that unites Jewish immigrants with everyone who cares about the future of great literature. And he enables us to see how an almost-lost culture is the bridge between the old world and the future. [via]More editions of Outwitting History: The Amazing Adventures of A Man Who Rescued A Million Yiddish Books:
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A People's History of the United Statesby Howard Zinn, Ww Norton & Co New PrISBN 1565843797 (1-56584-379-7)
Softcover, W W Norton & Co Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'A People's History of the United States'Book summary:Few works of American history have done more to change the way in which recent generations have looked at their past than Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States. Currently in its 25th printing, Zinn's work presents more than five hundred years of American social and cultural history, going well beyond the wars and presidencies of traditional texts to tell the stories of working men and women. For the first time, Zinn has abridged the original text for classroom use. Questions and activities to encourage critical thinking, topics for writing and discussion, and a bibliography of related materials by educator Kathy Emery accompany each chapter covering American history from Columbus to Clinton. [via]
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A People's History of the United States: Teaching Editionby Howard ZinnISBN 1565843665 (1-56584-366-5)
Hardcover, W W Norton & Co Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'A People's History of the United States: Teaching Edition'Book summary:Few works of American history have done more to change the way in which recent generations have looked at their past than Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States. Currently in its 25th printing, Zinn's work presents more than five hundred years of American social and cultural history, going well beyond the wars and presidencies of traditional texts to tell the stories of working men and women. For the first time, Zinn has abridged the original text for classroom use. Questions and activities to encourage critical thinking, topics for writing and discussion, and a bibliography of related materials by educator Kathy Emery accompany each chapter covering American history from Columbus to Clinton. [via]
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A People's History of the United States: The Wall Chartsby Howard Zinn, George KirschnerISBN 1565841719 (1-56584-171-9)
Softcover, New Pr
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› Find signed collectible books: 'A People's History of the United States: The Wall Charts'Book summary:Zinn's classic work in its most innovative format: myth-busting posters.
Few works of American history have done more to change the way in which recent generations have looked at their past than Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States. With millions of copies sold, Zinn's social history fleshes out the bare skeleton of traditional historical texts with the stories of working men and women throughout this country's history.
A People's History of the United States: The Wall Charts is a set of two posters and an explanatory booklet designed to bring the contents of the original People's History to an even broader audience. Illustrated in full color, they portray over five hundred years of American social and cultural history. Organized thematically as well as chronologically, they allow the reader to trace the developments of specific topicsfrom slavery and resistance to the role of womenthrough images and quotations that go well beyond the wars and presidencies of traditional American history.
A People's History of the United States: The Wall Charts creates a unique tool for learning about American history from the celebrated book that turned history on its head. [via]More editions of A People's History of the United States: The Wall Charts:
Pet Semataryby Stephen KingISBN 1568495455 (1-56849-545-5)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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Phone Calls from the Deadby Wendy BrennerISBN 1565122453 (1-56512-245-3)
Hardcover, Algonquin Books
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Pilgrim at Tinker Creekby Annie DillardISBN 1568497067 (1-56849-706-7)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Pilgrim at Tinker Creek'Book summary:The Pulitzer Prize-winning work by the author whom The Boston Globe called "one of the most distinctive voices in American letters today." [via]
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Place Where the Sea Remembersby Sandra BenitezISBN 156689011X (1-56689-011-X)
Hardcover, Coffee House Pr
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Plays in One Actby Daniel HalpernISBN 1567311644 (1-56731-164-4)
Hardcover, Fine Communications
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Politically Correct Bedtime Storiesby James Finn GarnerISBN 1568952376 (1-56895-237-6)
Hardcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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The Politics of Life: Four Playsby Wakako Yamauchi, Velina Hasu Houston, Genny LimISBN 1566390001 (1-56639-000-1)
Hardcover, Temple Univ Pr
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The Politics of Life: Four Plays by Asian American Womenby Wakako Yamauchi, Velina Hasu Houston, Genny LimISBN 156639001X (1-56639-001-X)
Softcover, Temple Univ Pr
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Portnoy's Complaintby Philip RothISBN 156849324X (1-56849-324-X)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie: Library Editionby Muriel SparkISBN 1568496982 (1-56849-698-2)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie: Library Edition'Book summary:The classic bestselling book--the subject of a play, movie, and a song--that tells the darkly fascinating story of a young, unorthodox teacher and her special, and ultimately dangerous, relationship with six of her students. [via]
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Ray in Reverseby Daniel WallaceISBN 1565122607 (1-56512-260-7)
Hardcover, Algonquin Books
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The Rector's Wifeby Joanna TrollopeISBN 1568952007 (1-56895-200-7)
Hardcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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Rise and Fall of the Third Reichby William ShirerISBN 1567311636 (1-56731-163-6)
Hardcover, Fine Communications
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Rise and Fall of the Third Reich'Book summary:It was Hitler's boast that the Third Reich would last a thousand years. Instead it lasted only twelve. But into its short life was packed the most cataclysmic series of events that Western civilisation has ever known. William Shirer is one of the very few historians to have gained full access to the secret German archives which the Allies captured intact. He was also present at the Nuremberg trials. This is his authoritative historical account of the years 1933-45, when the Nazis, under the rule of their desporic leader Adolf Hitler, ruled Germany. They commandeered the Holocaust, one of the most shocking acts of evil in modern history, plunged the world into a second war, and changed the face of modern history and modern Europe forever. [via]
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Rootsby Alex HaleyISBN 1568494718 (1-56849-471-8)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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Rubyby V. C. AndrewsISBN 1568950748 (1-56895-074-8)
Hardcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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Secret Rendezvousby Kobo Abe, Winters CarpenterISBN 1568360037 (1-56836-003-7)
Softcover, Kodansha Amer Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Secret Rendezvous'Book summary:A man's frantic search for his vanished wife leads him to a sinister underground hospital. He encounters a sex-obsessed mix of patients and staff in this erotic satire of modern medicine. [via]
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Self-Defenseby Jonathan KellermanISBN 1568952066 (1-56895-206-6)
Hardcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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Silver Liningsby Jayne Ann KrentzISBN 1568950233 (1-56895-023-3)
Hardcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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Sphereby Michael CrichtonISBN 1568491271 (1-56849-127-1)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books, Incorporated
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Sphere'Book summary:Jurassic Park author Michael Crichton is possibly the best science teacher for the masses since H.G. Wells, and Sphere, his thriller about a mysterious spherical spaceship at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, is classic Crichton. A group of not-very-complex characters (portrayed in the film by Sharon Stone, Dustin Hoffman, Samuel L. Jackson, and Queen Latifah) assemble to solve a cleverly designed roller coaster of a mystery while attempting (with mixed success) to avoid sudden death and expounding (much more successfully) on the latest, coolest scientific ideas, including the existence of black holes. Somehow, Crichton manages to convey the complicated stuff in utterly simplistic prose, making him, as his old pal Steven Spielberg puts it, "the high priest of high concept." Yet there is more to Crichton than science and big-ticket show biz. He is also, as any reader of his startling memoir Travels knows, a bit of a mystic--he is entirely open to notions spouted by spoon-bending psychics that most science writers would scorn. Sphere is not only a gratifying sci-fi suspense tale; it also reflects Crichton's keen interest in the unexplained powers of the human mind. When something passes through a black hole in Crichton's fiction, a lesson is learned. The book also contains another profound lesson: when you're staring down a giant squid with an eyeball the size of a dinner plate, don't blink first. [via]
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The Sponsored Life: Ads, TV, and American Cultureby Leslie SavanISBN 1566392454 (1-56639-245-4)
Softcover, Temple Univ Pr
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The Stand: The Complete & Uncut Editionby Stephen KingISBN 1568495714 (1-56849-571-4)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Stand: The Complete & Uncut Edition'Book summary:In 1978, science fiction writer Spider Robinson wrote a scathing review of The Stand in which he exhorted his readers to grab strangers in bookstores and beg them not to buy it.
The Stand is like that. You either love it or hate it, but you can't ignore it. Stephen King's most popular book, according to polls of his fans, is an end-of-the-world scenario: a rapidly mutating flu virus is accidentally released from a U.S. military facility and wipes out 99 and 44/100 percent of the world's population, thus setting the stage for an apocalyptic confrontation between Good and Evil.
"I love to burn things up," King says. "It's the werewolf in me, I guess.... The Stand was particularly fulfilling, because there I got a chance to scrub the whole human race, and man, it was fun! ... Much of the compulsive, driven feeling I had while I worked on The Stand came from the vicarious thrill of imagining an entire entrenched social order destroyed in one stroke."
There is much to admire in The Stand: the vivid thumbnail sketches with which King populates a whole landscape with dozens of believable characters; the deep sense of nostalgia for things left behind; the way it subverts our sense of reality by showing us a world we find familiar, then flipping it over to reveal the darkness underneath. Anyone who wants to know, or claims to know, the heart of the American experience needs to read this book. --Fiona Webster [via]
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Starship Troopersby Robert A. HeinleinISBN 1568492871 (1-56849-287-1)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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Timber Warsby Judy BariISBN 1567510264 (1-56751-026-4)
Softcover, Common Courage Press
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Tunnel Visionby Sara ParetskyISBN 1568950845 (1-56895-084-5)
Softcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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Understanding Comicsby Scott McCloudISBN 1568620195 (1-56862-019-5)
Hardcover, Tundra Pub
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Understanding Comics'Book summary:216 page paperback written in comic book form about the world's most misunderstood artform. [via]
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Understanding Power: The Indispensible Chomskyby Noam Chomsky, John SchoeffelISBN 1565847032 (1-56584-703-2)
Softcover, W W Norton & Co Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Understanding Power: The Indispensible Chomsky'Book summary:Understanding Power is a wide-ranging collection of transcribed and previously unpublished discussions and seminars (from 1989 to 1999) with sociopolitical analyst Noam Chomsky.
The chapters, each covering discrete sessions with Chomsky, arrive in a question-and-answer format that at times becomes delightfully contentious. Chomsky holds forth on such disparate topics as American third-party politics, the stifling of true dissent, the illusion of a muscular media, heavy-handed American imperialism (from Southeast Asia to Mexico), a dysfunctional and self-destructing United States political left, the gilding of the Kennedy and Carter administrations, and the impotent state of labor unions.
The relatively accessibility of Understanding Power is a welcome balance to Chomsky's often formidable scholarly writings. This is a book best taken in doses: a sort of bedside reader. --H. O'Billovitch [via]
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The Unthinkable Thoughts Of Jacob Greenby Joshua BraffISBN 1565124200 (1-56512-420-0)
Hardcover, Algonquin Books
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Until Youby Judith McNaughtISBN 1568951604 (1-56895-160-4)
Hardcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Until You'Book summary:A sequel to "Whitney, My Love", which won the "Romantic Times" Award for Best New Historical Novel. Sheridan Bromleigh is on her way from America, chaperoning the spoilt heiress Charise Lancaster, who is to marry Lord Burleton. But pea-brained Charise elopes with a man she meets on board ship. [via]
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Vby Thomas PynchonISBN 1568493215 (1-56849-321-5)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'V'Book summary:Having just been released from the Navy, Benny Profane is content to lead a slothful existence with his friends, where the only real ambition is to perfect the art of "schlemihlhood," or being a dupe, and where "responsibility" is a dirty word. Among his pals--called the Whole Sick Crew--is Slab, an artist who can't seem to paint anything other than cheese danishes. But Profane's life changes dramatically when he befriends Stencil, an active ambitious young man with an intriguing mission--to find out the identity of a woman named V., who knew Stencil's father during the war, but who suddenly and mysteriously disappeared. [via]
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Water for Elephants: Library Editionby Sara GruenISBN 1565125606 (1-56512-560-6)
Softcover, Algonquin Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Water for Elephants: Library Edition'Book summary:Jacob Jankowski says: "I am ninety. Or ninety-three. One or the other." At the beginning of Water for Elephants, he is living out his days in a nursing home, hating every second of it. His life wasn't always like this, however, because Jacob ran away and joined the circus when he was twenty-one. It wasn't a romantic, carefree decision, to be sure. His parents were killed in an auto accident one week before he was to sit for his veterinary medicine exams at Cornell. He buried his parents, learned that they left him nothing because they had mortgaged everything to pay his tuition, returned to school, went to the exams, and didn't write a single word. He walked out without completing the test and wound up on a circus train. The circus he joins, in Depression-era America, is second-rate at best. With Ringling Brothers as the standard, Benzini Brothers is far down the scale and pale by comparison.
Water for Elephants is the story of Jacob's life with this circus. Sara Gruen spares no detail in chronicling the squalid, filthy, brutish circumstances in which he finds himself. The animals are mangy, underfed or fed rotten food, and abused. Jacob, once it becomes known that he has veterinary skills, is put in charge of the "menagerie" and all its ills. Uncle Al, the circus impresario, is a self-serving, venal creep who slaps people around because he can. August, the animal trainer, is a certified paranoid schizophrenic whose occasional flights into madness and brutality often have Jacob as their object. Jacob is the only person in the book who has a handle on a moral compass and as his reward he spends most of the novel beaten, broken, concussed, bleeding, swollen and hungover. He is the self-appointed Protector of the Downtrodden, and... he falls in love with Marlena, crazy August's wife. Not his best idea.
The most interesting aspect of the book is all the circus lore that Gruen has so carefully researched. She has all the right vocabulary: grifters, roustabouts, workers, cooch tent, rubes, First of May, what the band plays when there's trouble, Jamaican ginger paralysis, life on a circus train, set-up and take-down, being run out of town by the "revenooers" or the cops, and losing all your hooch. There is one glorious passage about Marlena and Rosie, the bull elephant, that truly evokes the magic a circus can create. It is easy to see Marlena's and Rosie's pink sequins under the Big Top and to imagine their perfect choreography as they perform unbelievable stunts. The crowd loves it--and so will the reader. The ending is absolutely ludicrous and really quite lovely. --Valerie Ryan [via]
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Whitney, My Loveby Judith McNaughtISBN 1568951078 (1-56895-107-8)
Hardcover, Wheeler Pub Inc
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Who Killed Roger Ackroyd?: The Mystery Behind the Agatha Christie Mysteryby Carol Cosman, Pierre BayardISBN 156584579X (1-56584-579-X)
Hardcover, W W Norton & Co Inc
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Who Killed Roger Ackroyd?: The Mystery Behind the Agatha Christie Mystery'Book summary:Penzler Pick, August 2000: Edmund Wilson, the famous literary critic, once inquired disdainfully (in an essay explaining his inability to develop the mystery-reading habit), "Who Cares Who Killed Roger Ackroyd?" In a single sentence, with its reference to the notorious plot of Agatha Christie's sixth novel, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, he struck deep at the collective spirit of a community of like-minded souls: the detective fiction readers of the world. Ever since 1926, when the novel in question was first published, helping to insure its author's reputation as the ruling queen of crafty crime, mystery fans have indeed cared. Passionately.
But until the arrival of this provocative rereading of the case, written by a psychoanalyst and translated from the French, it is likely that not one of them ever doubted the validity of the solution as worked out by the redoubtable Hercule Poirot. After all, if the author's own detective had incorrectly followed the clues laid down for him, what kind of unsteady ground was the reader left standing on?
Although Bayard makes it clear that those picking up his book don't necessarily have to return to the original text--he does give a very concise summary of the principal characters and actions of Christie's story--it is an exercise, really a pleasure, that I urge you toward. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is such a landmark of the genre that it is not just a bit of nostalgia, a form of genial time travel, but also a reminder of what the Golden Age of the mystery novel was all about: the matching of wits between writer and reader, with puzzles that truly puzzled and were made all the more satisfying by the operative credo of fair play.
To address the actual plot of The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is to risk spoiling the fun. Let's just say there is an English village, King's Abbott, in which a bluff country squire, the much-mentioned Ackroyd, resides until his untimely death, [stabbed] by an unknown assailant. Unfortunately for the murderer--or so one used to think, pre-Pierre Bayard--there is also in the village a retired Belgian police inspector, the unparalleled M. Hercule Poirot. Poirot's celebrated "little grey cells," those he uses to form his theories of a case, steadily power the investigation to its startling conclusion, one that has always been as magnificent for its shock value as for its apparently irrefutable logic. That Professor Bayard's delicate probing of the book's structure manages to turn it convincingly in a fresh direction, toward an actual murderer never even suspected, is a triumph of scholarship that is at once playful and serious.
How we approach classic texts should never be as static an experience as we generally allow it to be, a truth proved anew by Who Killed Roger Ackroyd? It now joins a list of other similarly clever literary treats, among which I include Rex Stout's "Watson Was a Woman" and Frederick Crews's The Pooh Perplex. --Otto Penzler [via]
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Who Killed Roger Ackroyd?: The Mystery Behind the Agatha Christie Mysteryby Pierre Bayard, Carol CosmanISBN 156584677X (1-56584-677-X)
Softcover, New Pr
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Who Killed Roger Ackroyd?: The Mystery Behind the Agatha Christie Mystery'Book summary:Penzler Pick, August 2000: Edmund Wilson, the famous literary critic, once inquired disdainfully (in an essay explaining his inability to develop the mystery-reading habit), "Who Cares Who Killed Roger Ackroyd?" In a single sentence, with its reference to the notorious plot of Agatha Christie's sixth novel, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, he struck deep at the collective spirit of a community of like-minded souls: the detective fiction readers of the world. Ever since 1926, when the novel in question was first published, helping to insure its author's reputation as the ruling queen of crafty crime, mystery fans have indeed cared. Passionately.
But until the arrival of this provocative rereading of the case, written by a psychoanalyst and translated from the French, it is likely that not one of them ever doubted the validity of the solution as worked out by the redoubtable Hercule Poirot. After all, if the author's own detective had incorrectly followed the clues laid down for him, what kind of unsteady ground was the reader left standing on?
Although Bayard makes it clear that those picking up his book don't necessarily have to return to the original text--he does give a very concise summary of the principal characters and actions of Christie's story--it is an exercise, really a pleasure, that I urge you toward. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is such a landmark of the genre that it is not just a bit of nostalgia, a form of genial time travel, but also a reminder of what the Golden Age of the mystery novel was all about: the matching of wits between writer and reader, with puzzles that truly puzzled and were made all the more satisfying by the operative credo of fair play.
To address the actual plot of The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is to risk spoiling the fun. Let's just say there is an English village, King's Abbott, in which a bluff country squire, the much-mentioned Ackroyd, resides until his untimely death, [stabbed] by an unknown assailant. Unfortunately for the murderer--or so one used to think, pre-Pierre Bayard--there is also in the village a retired Belgian police inspector, the unparalleled M. Hercule Poirot. Poirot's celebrated "little grey cells," those he uses to form his theories of a case, steadily power the investigation to its startling conclusion, one that has always been as magnificent for its shock value as for its apparently irrefutable logic. That Professor Bayard's delicate probing of the book's structure manages to turn it convincingly in a fresh direction, toward an actual murderer never even suspected, is a triumph of scholarship that is at once playful and serious.
How we approach classic texts should never be as static an experience as we generally allow it to be, a truth proved anew by Who Killed Roger Ackroyd? It now joins a list of other similarly clever literary treats, among which I include Rex Stout's "Watson Was a Woman" and Frederick Crews's The Pooh Perplex. --Otto Penzler [via]
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Wide Sargasso Seaby Jean Rhys, Charlotte BronteISBN 1568497296 (1-56849-729-6)
Hardcover, Buccaneer Books
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Wide Sargasso Sea'Book summary:In 1966 Jean Rhys reemerged after a long silence with a novel called Wide Sargasso Sea. Rhys had enjoyed minor literary success in the 1920s and '30s with a series of evocative novels featuring women protagonists adrift in Europe, verging on poverty, hoping to be saved by men. By the '40s, however, her work was out of fashion, too sad for a world at war. And Rhys herself was often too sad for the world--she was suicidal, alcoholic, troubled by a vast loneliness. She was also a great writer, despite her powerful self-destructive impulses.
Wide Sargasso Sea is the story of Antoinette Cosway, a Creole heiress who grew up in the West Indies on a decaying plantation. When she comes of age she is married off to an Englishman, and he takes her away from the only place she has known--a house with a garden where "the paths were overgrown and a smell of dead flowers mixed with the fresh living smell. Underneath the tree ferns, tall as forest tree ferns, the light was green. Orchids flourished out of reach or for some reason not to be touched."
The novel is Rhys's answer to Jane Eyre. Charlotte Brontë's book had long haunted her, mostly for the story it did not tell--that of the madwoman in the attic, Rochester's terrible secret. Antoinette is Rhys's imagining of that locked-up woman, who in the end burns up the house and herself. Wide Sargasso Sea follows her voyage into the dark, both from her point of view and Rochester's. It is a voyage charged with soul-destroying lust. "I watched her die many times," observes the new husband. "In my way, not in hers. In sunlight, in shadow, by moonlight, by candlelight. In the long afternoons when the house was empty."
Rhys struggled over the book, enduring rejections and revisions, wrestling to bring this ruined woman out of the ashes. The slim volume was finally published when she was 70 years old. The critical adulation that followed, she said, "has come too late." Jean Rhys died a few years later, but with Wide Sargasso Sea she left behind a great legacy, a work of strange, scary loveliness. There has not been a book like it before or since. Believe me, I've been searching. --Emily White [via]
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The Wild Numbersby Philibert SchogtISBN 1568581661 (1-56858-166-1)
Hardcover, Thunder's Mouth Pr
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Wild Numbers'Book summary:Mathematical insight is like an assassin's bullet--you don't know it's there until it hits you. Dutch philosopher and mathematician Philibert Schogt shows us the workings of the math-obsessed mind in his short novel The Wild Numbers. Following the mental and physical ramblings of the unspectacular Professor Isaac Swift as he comes closer to solving a beautifully thorny problem left behind generations ago by an eccentric French genius, the book cleverly dissects the forces driving mathematical creativity. Swift just barely balances his overpowering mental impulses, often likened to a "buzzing in his head," with his physical and social needs. Those familiar with academic math departments will find Schogt's eccentric crank Leonard Vale entertaining and all too true:
The pages crawled with incomprehensible equations in his familiar scratchy handwriting. He always threw in as many integral signs, sigmas, and other mathematical symbols as possible, reminding me of the calculations of comic book geniuses. Here and there he had left a clearing in the dense jungle of formulae, in which he had written profound aphorisms, underlined three times and followed by three exclamation marks.
Vale becomes a serious problem when he accuses Swift of plagiarizing his work, driving the novel toward its dark conclusion. Nonmathematical readers shouldn't fear--the few equations are simply illustrations of Swift's thinking, and no advanced knowledge is required to follow the plot. Contrasting the flash of insight with the dull glow of truth, The Wild Numbers illuminates the plight of a mathematical mind stuck in a real world. --Rob Lightner [via]More editions of The Wild Numbers:
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The Woman in Blackby Susan Hill, John LawrenceISBN 1567921892 (1-56792-189-2)
Softcover, David R Godine Pub
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Woman in Black'Book summary:What real reader does not yearn, somewhere in the recesses of his or her heart, for a really literate, first-class thriller - one that chills the body with foreboding of dark deeds to come, but warms the soul with perceptions and language at once astute and vivid? In other words, a ghost story by Jane Austen.
Austen we cannot, alas, give you, but Susan Hill's remarkable Woman In Black comes as close as the late twentieth century is likely to provide. Set on the obligatory English moor, on an isolated causeway, the story has as its hero one Arthur Kipps, an up-and-coming young solicitor who has come north to attend the funeral and settle the estate of Mrs. Alice Drablow of Eel Marsh House. The routine formalities he anticipates give way to a tumble of events and secrets more sinister and terrifying than any nightmare: the rocking chair in the nursery of the deserted Eel Marsh House, the eerie sound of pony and trap, a child's scream in the fog, and, most dreadfully, and for Kipps most tragically, the woman in black.
The Woman In Black is both a brilliant exercise in atmosphere and controlled horror and a delicious spine-tingler - proof positive that that neglected genre, the ghost story, isn't dead after all. [via]More editions of The Woman in Black:
Yo!by Julia AlvarezISBN 1565121570 (1-56512-157-0)
Hardcover, Algonquin Books
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