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General Recommendations
April's Fiction Hidden Gems: February 2025
MARINet
Staff-created list
Some choice fiction titles worthy of another look. - April MCFL
MARINet
Book - 2011
2012 PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Award 2012 ILBA Mariposa Award for Best First Book Set in Chandler, Arizona, during the city's infamous 1997 migrant swe...Show more
2012 PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Award 2012 ILBA Mariposa Award for Best First Book Set in Chandler, Arizona, during the city's infamous 1997 migrant sweeps, this riveting tale brings to life the social issues that arise from border policy and economic inequity. Palacio skillfully weaves a story of politics, intrigue, love, and trust in a community that is suspicious of others, an attitude she experienced firsthand after moving to Chandler in the late 1990s. "The neighbors suspected that the house I bought was a way-station for undocumented immigrants," she recalls. Thus, the seeds for Ocotillo Dreams were sown. In it, we meet Isola, a young woman who inherits a Chandler home and relocates there temporarily. There she learns that her mother had lived a secret life of helping the undocumented workers. Isola must confront her own confusion and sense of loyalty in a strange and unwelcoming environment. As she gets to know her mother from clues left behind, she grapples with issues of identity and belonging that lead her on a journey toward purpose in life and reconnection with her roots.
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2012 PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Award 2012 ILBA Mariposa Award for Best First Book Set in Chandler, Arizona, during the city's infamous 1997 migrant swe...Show more
2012 PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Award 2012 ILBA Mariposa Award for Best First Book Set in Chandler, Arizona, during the city's infamous 1997 migrant sweeps, this riveting tale brings to life the social issues that arise from border policy and economic inequity. Palacio skillfully weaves a story of politics, intrigue, love, and trust in a community that is suspicious of others, an attitude she experienced firsthand after moving to Chandler in the late 1990s. "The neighbors suspected that the house I bought was a way-station for undocumented immigrants," she recalls. Thus, the seeds for Ocotillo Dreams were sown. In it, we meet Isola, a young woman who inherits a Chandler home and relocates there temporarily. There she learns that her mother had lived a secret life of helping the undocumented workers. Isola must confront her own confusion and sense of loyalty in a strange and unwelcoming environment. As she gets to know her mother from clues left behind, she grapples with issues of identity and belonging that lead her on a journey toward purpose in life and reconnection with her roots.
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Book - 1985
A powerful look at an affluent black community from Gloria Naylor (1950-2016), the National Book Award-winning author of The Women of Brewster Place
A wo...Show more
A powerful look at an affluent black community from Gloria Naylor (1950-2016), the National Book Award-winning author of The Women of Brewster Place
A world away from Brewster Place, yet intimately connected to it, lies Linden Hills. With its showcase homes, elegant lawns, and other trappings of Wealth, Linden Hills is not unlike other affluent black communities. But residence in this community is indisputable evidence of "making it." Although no one knows what the precise qualifications are, everyone knows that only certain people get to live there - and that they want to be among them. In a resonant novel that takes as it's model Dante's Inferno, Gloria Naylor reveals the truth about the American dream - that the price of success may very well be on a journey down to the lowest circle of hell.
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A powerful look at an affluent black community from Gloria Naylor (1950-2016), the National Book Award-winning author of The Women of Brewster Place
A wo...Show more
A powerful look at an affluent black community from Gloria Naylor (1950-2016), the National Book Award-winning author of The Women of Brewster Place
A world away from Brewster Place, yet intimately connected to it, lies Linden Hills. With its showcase homes, elegant lawns, and other trappings of Wealth, Linden Hills is not unlike other affluent black communities. But residence in this community is indisputable evidence of "making it." Although no one knows what the precise qualifications are, everyone knows that only certain people get to live there - and that they want to be among them. In a resonant novel that takes as it's model Dante's Inferno, Gloria Naylor reveals the truth about the American dream - that the price of success may very well be on a journey down to the lowest circle of hell.
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Book - 2014
An intimate portrayal of the drug wars in Colombia, from international fiction star Juan Gabriel Vasquez.
Juan Gabriel Vásquez has been hailed not only a...Show more
An intimate portrayal of the drug wars in Colombia, from international fiction star Juan Gabriel Vasquez.
Juan Gabriel Vásquez has been hailed not only as one of South America’s greatest literary stars, but also as one of the most acclaimed writers of his generation. In this New York Times-bestselling, award-winning, gorgeously wrought novel, Vásquez confronts the history of his home country, Colombia.
In the city of Bogotá, Antonio Yammara reads an article about a hippo that had escaped from a derelict zoo once owned by legendary Colombian drug kingpin Pablo Escobar. The article transports Antonio back to when the war between Escobar’s Medellín cartel and government forces played out violently in Colombia’s streets and in the skies above. Back then, Antonio witnessed a friend’s murder, an event that haunts him still. As he investigates, he discovers the many ways in which his own life and his friend’s family have been shaped by his country’s recent violent past. His journey leads him all the way back to the 1960s and a world on the brink of change: a time before narco-trafficking trapped a whole generation in a living nightmare.
Vásquez is “one of the most original new voices of Latin American literature,” according to Nobel Prize winner Mario Vargas Llosa, and The Sound of Things Falling is his most personal, most contemporary novel to date, a masterpiece that takes his writing—and his literary star—even higher.
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An intimate portrayal of the drug wars in Colombia, from international fiction star Juan Gabriel Vasquez.
Juan Gabriel Vásquez has been hailed not only a...Show more
An intimate portrayal of the drug wars in Colombia, from international fiction star Juan Gabriel Vasquez.
Juan Gabriel Vásquez has been hailed not only as one of South America’s greatest literary stars, but also as one of the most acclaimed writers of his generation. In this New York Times-bestselling, award-winning, gorgeously wrought novel, Vásquez confronts the history of his home country, Colombia.
In the city of Bogotá, Antonio Yammara reads an article about a hippo that had escaped from a derelict zoo once owned by legendary Colombian drug kingpin Pablo Escobar. The article transports Antonio back to when the war between Escobar’s Medellín cartel and government forces played out violently in Colombia’s streets and in the skies above. Back then, Antonio witnessed a friend’s murder, an event that haunts him still. As he investigates, he discovers the many ways in which his own life and his friend’s family have been shaped by his country’s recent violent past. His journey leads him all the way back to the 1960s and a world on the brink of change: a time before narco-trafficking trapped a whole generation in a living nightmare.
Vásquez is “one of the most original new voices of Latin American literature,” according to Nobel Prize winner Mario Vargas Llosa, and The Sound of Things Falling is his most personal, most contemporary novel to date, a masterpiece that takes his writing—and his literary star—even higher.
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A Novel
Book - 2016
Derek Palacio’s stunning, mythic novel marks the arrival of a fresh voice and a new chapter in the history of 21st century Cuban-American literature.
In...Show more
Derek Palacio’s stunning, mythic novel marks the arrival of a fresh voice and a new chapter in the history of 21st century Cuban-American literature.
In 1980, a rural Cuban family is torn apart during the Mariel Boatlift. Uxbal Encarnación—father, husband, political insurgent—refuses to leave behind the revolutionary ideals and lush tomato farms of his sun-soaked homeland. His wife Soledad takes young Isabel and Ulises hostage and flees with them to America, leaving behind Uxbal for the promise of a better life. But instead of settling with fellow Cuban immigrants in Miami’s familiar heat, Soledad pushes further north into the stark, wintry landscape of Hartford, Connecticut. There, in the long shadow of their estranged patriarch, now just a distant memory, the exiled mother and her children begin a process of growth and transformation.
Each struggles and flourishes in their own way: Isabel, spiritually hungry and desperate for higher purpose, finds herself tethered to death and the dying in uncanny ways. Ulises is bookish and awkwardly tall, like his father, whose memory haunts and shapes the boy's thoughts and desires. Presiding over them both is Soledad. Once consumed by her love for her husband, she begins a tempestuous new relationship with a Dutch tobacco farmer. But just as the Encarnacións begin to cultivate their strange new way of life, Cuba calls them back. Uxbal is alive, and waiting.
Breathtaking, soulful, and profound, The Mortifications is an intoxicating family saga and a timely, urgent expression of longing for one's true homeland.
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Derek Palacio’s stunning, mythic novel marks the arrival of a fresh voice and a new chapter in the history of 21st century Cuban-American literature.
In...Show more
Derek Palacio’s stunning, mythic novel marks the arrival of a fresh voice and a new chapter in the history of 21st century Cuban-American literature.
In 1980, a rural Cuban family is torn apart during the Mariel Boatlift. Uxbal Encarnación—father, husband, political insurgent—refuses to leave behind the revolutionary ideals and lush tomato farms of his sun-soaked homeland. His wife Soledad takes young Isabel and Ulises hostage and flees with them to America, leaving behind Uxbal for the promise of a better life. But instead of settling with fellow Cuban immigrants in Miami’s familiar heat, Soledad pushes further north into the stark, wintry landscape of Hartford, Connecticut. There, in the long shadow of their estranged patriarch, now just a distant memory, the exiled mother and her children begin a process of growth and transformation.
Each struggles and flourishes in their own way: Isabel, spiritually hungry and desperate for higher purpose, finds herself tethered to death and the dying in uncanny ways. Ulises is bookish and awkwardly tall, like his father, whose memory haunts and shapes the boy's thoughts and desires. Presiding over them both is Soledad. Once consumed by her love for her husband, she begins a tempestuous new relationship with a Dutch tobacco farmer. But just as the Encarnacións begin to cultivate their strange new way of life, Cuba calls them back. Uxbal is alive, and waiting.
Breathtaking, soulful, and profound, The Mortifications is an intoxicating family saga and a timely, urgent expression of longing for one's true homeland.
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Book - 2010
The anti-war masterpiece that became an iconic motion picture-now with a foreword by the creator of the acclaimed HBO(tm) series The Wire
Familiar to man...Show more
The anti-war masterpiece that became an iconic motion picture-now with a foreword by the creator of the acclaimed HBO(tm) series The Wire
Familiar to many as the Stanley Kubrick film starring Kirk Douglas, Paths of Glory explores the perilous complications involved in what nations demand of their soldiers in wartime. Humphrey Cobb's protagonists are Frenchmen during the First World War whose nightmare in the trenches takes a new and terrible turn when they are ordered to assault a German position deemed all but invulnerable. When the attack fails, an inquiry into allegations of cowardice indicts a small handful of lower-ranked scapegoats whose trial exposes the farce of ordering ordinary men to risk their lives in an impossible cause. A chilling portrait of injustice, this novel offers insight into the tragedies of war in any age.
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The anti-war masterpiece that became an iconic motion picture-now with a foreword by the creator of the acclaimed HBO(tm) series The Wire
Familiar to man...Show more
The anti-war masterpiece that became an iconic motion picture-now with a foreword by the creator of the acclaimed HBO(tm) series The Wire
Familiar to many as the Stanley Kubrick film starring Kirk Douglas, Paths of Glory explores the perilous complications involved in what nations demand of their soldiers in wartime. Humphrey Cobb's protagonists are Frenchmen during the First World War whose nightmare in the trenches takes a new and terrible turn when they are ordered to assault a German position deemed all but invulnerable. When the attack fails, an inquiry into allegations of cowardice indicts a small handful of lower-ranked scapegoats whose trial exposes the farce of ordering ordinary men to risk their lives in an impossible cause. A chilling portrait of injustice, this novel offers insight into the tragedies of war in any age.
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by Nayeri, Dina
Book - 2013
From the author of Refuge, a magical novel about a young Iranian woman lifted from grief by her powerful imagination and love of Western culture.
Growin...Show more
From the author of Refuge, a magical novel about a young Iranian woman lifted from grief by her powerful imagination and love of Western culture.
Growing up in a small rice-farming village in 1980s Iran, eleven-year-old Saba Hafezi and her twin sister, Mahtab, are captivated by America. They keep lists of English words and collect illegal Life magazines, television shows, and rock music. So when her mother and sister disappear, leaving Saba and her father alone in Iran, Saba is certain that they have moved to America without her. But her parents have taught her that “all fate is written in the blood,” and that twins will live the same life, even if separated by land and sea. As she grows up in the warmth and community of her local village, falls in and out of love, and struggles with the limited possibilities in post-revolutionary Iran, Saba envisions that there is another way for her story to unfold. Somewhere, it must be that her sister is living the Western version of this life. And where Saba’s world has all the grit and brutality of real life under the new Islamic regime, her sister’s experience gives her a freedom and control that Saba can only dream of.
Filled with a colorful cast of characters and presented in a bewitching voice that mingles the rhythms of Eastern storytelling with modern Western prose, A Teaspoon of Earth and Sea is a tale about memory and the importance of controlling one’s own fate.
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From the author of Refuge, a magical novel about a young Iranian woman lifted from grief by her powerful imagination and love of Western culture.
Growin...Show more
From the author of Refuge, a magical novel about a young Iranian woman lifted from grief by her powerful imagination and love of Western culture.
Growing up in a small rice-farming village in 1980s Iran, eleven-year-old Saba Hafezi and her twin sister, Mahtab, are captivated by America. They keep lists of English words and collect illegal Life magazines, television shows, and rock music. So when her mother and sister disappear, leaving Saba and her father alone in Iran, Saba is certain that they have moved to America without her. But her parents have taught her that “all fate is written in the blood,” and that twins will live the same life, even if separated by land and sea. As she grows up in the warmth and community of her local village, falls in and out of love, and struggles with the limited possibilities in post-revolutionary Iran, Saba envisions that there is another way for her story to unfold. Somewhere, it must be that her sister is living the Western version of this life. And where Saba’s world has all the grit and brutality of real life under the new Islamic regime, her sister’s experience gives her a freedom and control that Saba can only dream of.
Filled with a colorful cast of characters and presented in a bewitching voice that mingles the rhythms of Eastern storytelling with modern Western prose, A Teaspoon of Earth and Sea is a tale about memory and the importance of controlling one’s own fate.
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Book - 2013
FBI agents pursue a cold case in southern Ireland while a marine biologist finds herself caught in a conspiracy in this captivating romantic mystery.
Fo...Show more
FBI agents pursue a cold case in southern Ireland while a marine biologist finds herself caught in a conspiracy in this captivating romantic mystery.
For marine biologist Julianne Maroney, two weeks in tiny Declan’s Cross on the south Irish coast is a chance to heal her broken heart. She doesn’t expect to attract the attention of FBI agents Emma Sharpe and Colin Donovan, who are in Ireland for their own personal retreat.
Ten years ago, art was stolen from a mansion in Declan’s Cross—a baffling crime that was never solved. Now, from the moment Julianne sets foot on Irish soil, everything goes wrong. The well-connected American diver who invited her to Ireland has disappeared. And now Emma and Colin are asking questions.
As a dark conspiracy unfolds amid the breathtaking scenery of Declan’s Cross, the race is on to stop a ruthless killer . . . and the stakes have never been more personal for Emma and Colin.
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FBI agents pursue a cold case in southern Ireland while a marine biologist finds herself caught in a conspiracy in this captivating romantic mystery.
Fo...Show more
FBI agents pursue a cold case in southern Ireland while a marine biologist finds herself caught in a conspiracy in this captivating romantic mystery.
For marine biologist Julianne Maroney, two weeks in tiny Declan’s Cross on the south Irish coast is a chance to heal her broken heart. She doesn’t expect to attract the attention of FBI agents Emma Sharpe and Colin Donovan, who are in Ireland for their own personal retreat.
Ten years ago, art was stolen from a mansion in Declan’s Cross—a baffling crime that was never solved. Now, from the moment Julianne sets foot on Irish soil, everything goes wrong. The well-connected American diver who invited her to Ireland has disappeared. And now Emma and Colin are asking questions.
As a dark conspiracy unfolds amid the breathtaking scenery of Declan’s Cross, the race is on to stop a ruthless killer . . . and the stakes have never been more personal for Emma and Colin.
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Glenn Ganges Comics
Graphic Novel - 2012
In Gloriana, Kevin Huizenga exposes the mechanics that underpin everyday life. His protagonist, Glenn Ganges, has conversations about dish soap and librar...Show more
In Gloriana, Kevin Huizenga exposes the mechanics that underpin everyday life. His protagonist, Glenn Ganges, has conversations about dish soap and library visits that are both faithful depictions of mundane interactions and existential dissections of the units that construct our lives. Huizenga has an understated, quiet approach to story writing that allows his characters (and his readers) the self-awareness to recognize the humor and tragedy of every moment.
Huizenga's much-lauded work is finely detailed, and in its innovative use of form, it explores the boundaries of the comic medium, deconstructing and reconstructing panels to express temporality and lived experience more fully. Presented in this expanded edition, Gloriana employs familiar settings and thorough, sometimes scientific explanations to reach thoughtful conclusions.
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In Gloriana, Kevin Huizenga exposes the mechanics that underpin everyday life. His protagonist, Glenn Ganges, has conversations about dish soap and librar...Show more
In Gloriana, Kevin Huizenga exposes the mechanics that underpin everyday life. His protagonist, Glenn Ganges, has conversations about dish soap and library visits that are both faithful depictions of mundane interactions and existential dissections of the units that construct our lives. Huizenga has an understated, quiet approach to story writing that allows his characters (and his readers) the self-awareness to recognize the humor and tragedy of every moment.
Huizenga's much-lauded work is finely detailed, and in its innovative use of form, it explores the boundaries of the comic medium, deconstructing and reconstructing panels to express temporality and lived experience more fully. Presented in this expanded edition, Gloriana employs familiar settings and thorough, sometimes scientific explanations to reach thoughtful conclusions.
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A Novel
Book - 2013
Max Walker is a golden boy. Attractive, intelligent, and athletic, he’s the perfect son, the perfect friend, and the perfect crush for the girls in his sc...Show more
Max Walker is a golden boy. Attractive, intelligent, and athletic, he’s the perfect son, the perfect friend, and the perfect crush for the girls in his school. He’s even really nice to his little brother. Karen, Max’s mother, is determined to maintain the façade of effortless excellence she has constructed through the years, but now that the boys are getting older, she worries that the façade might soon begin to crumble. Adding to the tension, her husband Steve has chosen this moment to stand for election to Parliament. The spotlight of the media is about to encircle their lives.
The Walkers are hiding something, you see. Max is special. Max is different. Max is intersex. When an enigmatic childhood friend named Hunter steps out of his past and abuses his trust in the worst possible way, Max is forced to consider the nature of his well-kept secret. Why won’t his parents talk about it? What else are they hiding from Max about his condition and from each other? The deeper Max goes, the more questions emerge about where it all leaves him and what his future holds, especially now that he’s starting to fall head over heels for someone for the first time in his life. Will his friends accept him if he is no longer the Golden Boy? Will anyone ever want him—desire him—once they know? And the biggest one of all, the question he has to look inside himself to answer: Who is Max Walker, really?
Golden Boy is a novel you’ll read in one sitting but will never forget; at once a riveting tale of a family in crisis, a fascinating exploration of identity, and a coming-of-age story like no other.
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Max Walker is a golden boy. Attractive, intelligent, and athletic, he’s the perfect son, the perfect friend, and the perfect crush for the girls in his sc...Show more
Max Walker is a golden boy. Attractive, intelligent, and athletic, he’s the perfect son, the perfect friend, and the perfect crush for the girls in his school. He’s even really nice to his little brother. Karen, Max’s mother, is determined to maintain the façade of effortless excellence she has constructed through the years, but now that the boys are getting older, she worries that the façade might soon begin to crumble. Adding to the tension, her husband Steve has chosen this moment to stand for election to Parliament. The spotlight of the media is about to encircle their lives.
The Walkers are hiding something, you see. Max is special. Max is different. Max is intersex. When an enigmatic childhood friend named Hunter steps out of his past and abuses his trust in the worst possible way, Max is forced to consider the nature of his well-kept secret. Why won’t his parents talk about it? What else are they hiding from Max about his condition and from each other? The deeper Max goes, the more questions emerge about where it all leaves him and what his future holds, especially now that he’s starting to fall head over heels for someone for the first time in his life. Will his friends accept him if he is no longer the Golden Boy? Will anyone ever want him—desire him—once they know? And the biggest one of all, the question he has to look inside himself to answer: Who is Max Walker, really?
Golden Boy is a novel you’ll read in one sitting but will never forget; at once a riveting tale of a family in crisis, a fascinating exploration of identity, and a coming-of-age story like no other.
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Book - 2009
When Blue Bird and her grandmother leave their family’s camp to gather beans for the long, threatening winter, they inadvertently avoid the horrible fate ...Show more
When Blue Bird and her grandmother leave their family’s camp to gather beans for the long, threatening winter, they inadvertently avoid the horrible fate that befalls the rest of the family. Luckily, the two women are adopted by a nearby Dakota community and are eventually integrated into their kinship circles. Ella Cara Deloria’s tale follows Blue Bird and her daughter, Waterlily, through the intricate kinship practices that created unity among her people.
Waterlily, published after Deloria’s death and generally viewed as the masterpiece of her career, offers a captivating glimpse into the daily life of the nineteenth-century Sioux.
This new Bison Books edition features an introduction by Susan Gardner and an index.
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When Blue Bird and her grandmother leave their family’s camp to gather beans for the long, threatening winter, they inadvertently avoid the horrible fate ...Show more
When Blue Bird and her grandmother leave their family’s camp to gather beans for the long, threatening winter, they inadvertently avoid the horrible fate that befalls the rest of the family. Luckily, the two women are adopted by a nearby Dakota community and are eventually integrated into their kinship circles. Ella Cara Deloria’s tale follows Blue Bird and her daughter, Waterlily, through the intricate kinship practices that created unity among her people.
Waterlily, published after Deloria’s death and generally viewed as the masterpiece of her career, offers a captivating glimpse into the daily life of the nineteenth-century Sioux.
This new Bison Books edition features an introduction by Susan Gardner and an index.
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A Novel
Book - 2014
The first novel by Newbery Award–winning author Nancy Willard: A stunning story of magic and miracles, and a testament to the enduring power of faith and...Show more
The first novel by Newbery Award–winning author Nancy Willard: A stunning story of magic and miracles, and a testament to the enduring power of faith and love
Ben and Willie Harkissian are twin brothers (think Cain and Abel, Jacob and Esau) growing up in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on the eve of World War II. A baseball launched into the October sky sets in motion a series of events that transforms many lives. Ben leaves for the front and faces death—figuratively as well as literally. Left behind is Clare Bishop, who has been paralyzed from the waist down. But in exchange she receives some very special gifts. She can see the future, be at one with animals, and chat with Death. Willie Harkissian remains in Michigan as well, though his relationship with his brother will never be the same.
A love story interrupted by war, this is also a novel about discovering the ordinary in the extraordinary and finding the miraculous in everyday life.
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The first novel by Newbery Award–winning author Nancy Willard: A stunning story of magic and miracles, and a testament to the enduring power of faith and...Show more
The first novel by Newbery Award–winning author Nancy Willard: A stunning story of magic and miracles, and a testament to the enduring power of faith and love
Ben and Willie Harkissian are twin brothers (think Cain and Abel, Jacob and Esau) growing up in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on the eve of World War II. A baseball launched into the October sky sets in motion a series of events that transforms many lives. Ben leaves for the front and faces death—figuratively as well as literally. Left behind is Clare Bishop, who has been paralyzed from the waist down. But in exchange she receives some very special gifts. She can see the future, be at one with animals, and chat with Death. Willie Harkissian remains in Michigan as well, though his relationship with his brother will never be the same.
A love story interrupted by war, this is also a novel about discovering the ordinary in the extraordinary and finding the miraculous in everyday life.
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Book - 2015
Walter Mosley's talent knows no bounds. Inside a Silver Box continues to explore the cosmic questions entertainingly discussed in his Crosstown to Obliv...Show more
Walter Mosley's talent knows no bounds. Inside a Silver Box continues to explore the cosmic questions entertainingly discussed in his Crosstown to Oblivion. From life's meaning to the nature of good and evil, Mosley takes readers on a speculative journey beyond reality.
In Inside a Silver Box, two people brought together by a horrific act are united in a common cause by the powers of the Silver Box. The two join to protect humanity from destruction by an alien race, the Laz, hell-bent on regaining control over the Silver Box, the most destructive and powerful tool in the universe. The Silver Box will stop at nothing to prevent its former master from returning to being, even if it means finishing the earth itself.
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Walter Mosley's talent knows no bounds. Inside a Silver Box continues to explore the cosmic questions entertainingly discussed in his Crosstown to Obliv...Show more
Walter Mosley's talent knows no bounds. Inside a Silver Box continues to explore the cosmic questions entertainingly discussed in his Crosstown to Oblivion. From life's meaning to the nature of good and evil, Mosley takes readers on a speculative journey beyond reality.
In Inside a Silver Box, two people brought together by a horrific act are united in a common cause by the powers of the Silver Box. The two join to protect humanity from destruction by an alien race, the Laz, hell-bent on regaining control over the Silver Box, the most destructive and powerful tool in the universe. The Silver Box will stop at nothing to prevent its former master from returning to being, even if it means finishing the earth itself.
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An Incident
by Hackl, Erich
Book - 2009
This extraordinary novel is based on a true story of the love between Rudi and Marga. Imprisoned in Auschwitz, Rudi petitions to be allowed to marry Marga...Show more
This extraordinary novel is based on a true story of the love between Rudi and Marga. Imprisoned in Auschwitz, Rudi petitions to be allowed to marry Marga and make his son legitimate. Eventually his petition is granted—no one knows why. Rudi’s wife and child are brought to Auschwitz, his father and brother come from Vienna, and the officials who normally spend all their time registering the deaths now register a marriage.
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This extraordinary novel is based on a true story of the love between Rudi and Marga. Imprisoned in Auschwitz, Rudi petitions to be allowed to marry Marga...Show more
This extraordinary novel is based on a true story of the love between Rudi and Marga. Imprisoned in Auschwitz, Rudi petitions to be allowed to marry Marga and make his son legitimate. Eventually his petition is granted—no one knows why. Rudi’s wife and child are brought to Auschwitz, his father and brother come from Vienna, and the officials who normally spend all their time registering the deaths now register a marriage.
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by Nisbet, Jim
Book - 2012
Possessing an unshakeable thirst for the good life in spite of the limitations of his Social Security checks, a homeless man pursues a dangerous life as a killer for hire. By the Pushcart Prize-nominated author of Windward Passage.
Possessing an unshakeable thirst for the good life in spite of the limitations of his Social Security checks, a homeless man pursues a dangerous life as a killer for hire. By the Pushcart Prize-nominated author of Windward Passage.
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Possessing an unshakeable thirst for the good life in spite of the limitations of his Social Security checks, a homeless man pursues a dangerous life as a killer for hire. By the Pushcart Prize-nominated author of Windward Passage.
Possessing an unshakeable thirst for the good life in spite of the limitations of his Social Security checks, a homeless man pursues a dangerous life as a killer for hire. By the Pushcart Prize-nominated author of Windward Passage.
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Book - 2016
The Sleep Garden explores and pushes the boundaries between fact and imagination, real and surreal, and life and the afterlife.
In an underground apart...Show more
The Sleep Garden explores and pushes the boundaries between fact and imagination, real and surreal, and life and the afterlife.
In an underground apartment building called “the Burrow”--essentially purgatory—“twilight souls” inhabit the space between life and death. Interwoven with their stories are those of inhabitants of the living world: a retired sea captain, a psychotic former child actor (possibly the sea captain’s illegitimate son?), and the technicians who monitor the Burrow, making sure its occupants have a constant supply of oxygen and food. Through all of their stories, and the ways in which their lives, past and present, intertwine, Krusoe creates a poignant story about what constitutes a life, what remains when we die, and what we possibly carry with us into the next world.
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The Sleep Garden explores and pushes the boundaries between fact and imagination, real and surreal, and life and the afterlife.
In an underground apart...Show more
The Sleep Garden explores and pushes the boundaries between fact and imagination, real and surreal, and life and the afterlife.
In an underground apartment building called “the Burrow”--essentially purgatory—“twilight souls” inhabit the space between life and death. Interwoven with their stories are those of inhabitants of the living world: a retired sea captain, a psychotic former child actor (possibly the sea captain’s illegitimate son?), and the technicians who monitor the Burrow, making sure its occupants have a constant supply of oxygen and food. Through all of their stories, and the ways in which their lives, past and present, intertwine, Krusoe creates a poignant story about what constitutes a life, what remains when we die, and what we possibly carry with us into the next world.
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A Novel
Book - 2007
From the “mesmerizing storyteller” (The New Yorker) and author of the bestselling memoir Makes Me Wanna Holler presents a profound novel—in the tradition...Show more
From the “mesmerizing storyteller” (The New Yorker) and author of the bestselling memoir Makes Me Wanna Holler presents a profound novel—in the tradition of Tom Wolfe’s The Bonfire of the Vanities and Zadie Smith’s White Teeth—that captures the dynamics of class and race in today's urban integrated communities.
Barlowe Reed is a single, forty-something Black American who rents a ramshackle house on Randolph Street in Atlanta, just a stone’s throw from the historic birth home of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Barlowe, who works as a printer, otherwise passes the time reading and hanging out with other men at the corner store. He shares his home and loner existence with a streetwise, twentysomething nephew who is struggling to get his troubled life back on track.
When Sean and Sandy Gilmore, a young white couple, move in next door, Barlowe and Sandy develop a reluctant, complex friendship as they hold probing—often frustrating—conversations over the backyard fence.
Members of both households, and their neighbors as well, try to go about their business, tending to their homes and jobs. However, fear and suspicion build—and clashes ensue—with each passing day, as more and more new whites move in and make changes and once familiar people and places disappear.
Using a blend of superbly developed characters in a story that captures the essence of this country’s struggles with the unsettling realities of gentrification, Nathan McCall has produced a truly great American novel.
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From the “mesmerizing storyteller” (The New Yorker) and author of the bestselling memoir Makes Me Wanna Holler presents a profound novel—in the tradition...Show more
From the “mesmerizing storyteller” (The New Yorker) and author of the bestselling memoir Makes Me Wanna Holler presents a profound novel—in the tradition of Tom Wolfe’s The Bonfire of the Vanities and Zadie Smith’s White Teeth—that captures the dynamics of class and race in today's urban integrated communities.
Barlowe Reed is a single, forty-something Black American who rents a ramshackle house on Randolph Street in Atlanta, just a stone’s throw from the historic birth home of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Barlowe, who works as a printer, otherwise passes the time reading and hanging out with other men at the corner store. He shares his home and loner existence with a streetwise, twentysomething nephew who is struggling to get his troubled life back on track.
When Sean and Sandy Gilmore, a young white couple, move in next door, Barlowe and Sandy develop a reluctant, complex friendship as they hold probing—often frustrating—conversations over the backyard fence.
Members of both households, and their neighbors as well, try to go about their business, tending to their homes and jobs. However, fear and suspicion build—and clashes ensue—with each passing day, as more and more new whites move in and make changes and once familiar people and places disappear.
Using a blend of superbly developed characters in a story that captures the essence of this country’s struggles with the unsettling realities of gentrification, Nathan McCall has produced a truly great American novel.
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Book - 2016
From one of our most important contemporary writers, The Doll-Master and Other Tales of Terror is a bold, haunting collection of six stories.
In the tit...Show more
From one of our most important contemporary writers, The Doll-Master and Other Tales of Terror is a bold, haunting collection of six stories.
In the title story, a young boy becomes obsessed with his cousin’s doll after she tragically passes away from leukemia. As he grows older, he begins to collect found dolls” from the surrounding neighborhoods and stores his treasures in the abandoned carriage house on his family's estate. But just what kind of dolls are they? In Gun Accident,” a teenage girl is thrilled when her favorite teacher asks her to house-sit, even on short notice. But when an intruder forces his way into the house while the girl is there, the fate of more than one life is changed forever. In Equatorial,” set in the exotic Galapagos, an affluent American wife experiences disorienting assaults upon her sense of who her charismatic husband really is, and what his plans may be for her.
In The Doll-Master and Other Tales of Terror, Joyce Carol Oates evokes the fascination of the abomination” that is at the core of the most profound, the most unsettling, and the most memorable of dark mystery fiction.
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From one of our most important contemporary writers, The Doll-Master and Other Tales of Terror is a bold, haunting collection of six stories.
In the tit...Show more
From one of our most important contemporary writers, The Doll-Master and Other Tales of Terror is a bold, haunting collection of six stories.
In the title story, a young boy becomes obsessed with his cousin’s doll after she tragically passes away from leukemia. As he grows older, he begins to collect found dolls” from the surrounding neighborhoods and stores his treasures in the abandoned carriage house on his family's estate. But just what kind of dolls are they? In Gun Accident,” a teenage girl is thrilled when her favorite teacher asks her to house-sit, even on short notice. But when an intruder forces his way into the house while the girl is there, the fate of more than one life is changed forever. In Equatorial,” set in the exotic Galapagos, an affluent American wife experiences disorienting assaults upon her sense of who her charismatic husband really is, and what his plans may be for her.
In The Doll-Master and Other Tales of Terror, Joyce Carol Oates evokes the fascination of the abomination” that is at the core of the most profound, the most unsettling, and the most memorable of dark mystery fiction.
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Book - 2021
Just in time for the centennial celebration of groundbreaking noir fiction writer Patricia Highsmith comes a reissue of her propulsive, engrossing debut, ...Show more
Just in time for the centennial celebration of groundbreaking noir fiction writer Patricia Highsmith comes a reissue of her propulsive, engrossing debut, Strangers on a Train, with a new introduction by best-selling author Paula Hawkins. Guy Haines and Charles Anthony Bruno are passengers on the same train. Haines is a successful architect in the midst of a divorce, Bruno a mysterious smooth-talker with a sadistic proposal: he’ll murder Haines’s wife if Haines will murder Bruno’s father. As Bruno carries out his twisted plan, Guy finds himself trapped in Highsmith’s perilous world, where, under the right circumstances, ordinary people are capable of extraordinary crimes. The inspiration for Alfred Hitchcock’s classic 1951 film, Strangers on a Train launched Highsmith’s prolific career, proving her a master at depicting the unsettling forces that tremble beneath the surface of everyday life.
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Just in time for the centennial celebration of groundbreaking noir fiction writer Patricia Highsmith comes a reissue of her propulsive, engrossing debut, ...Show more
Just in time for the centennial celebration of groundbreaking noir fiction writer Patricia Highsmith comes a reissue of her propulsive, engrossing debut, Strangers on a Train, with a new introduction by best-selling author Paula Hawkins. Guy Haines and Charles Anthony Bruno are passengers on the same train. Haines is a successful architect in the midst of a divorce, Bruno a mysterious smooth-talker with a sadistic proposal: he’ll murder Haines’s wife if Haines will murder Bruno’s father. As Bruno carries out his twisted plan, Guy finds himself trapped in Highsmith’s perilous world, where, under the right circumstances, ordinary people are capable of extraordinary crimes. The inspiration for Alfred Hitchcock’s classic 1951 film, Strangers on a Train launched Highsmith’s prolific career, proving her a master at depicting the unsettling forces that tremble beneath the surface of everyday life.
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Book - 2016
Lupita’s hard-knock life has gotten the better of her time and time again. A childhood robbed of innocence set off a chain of events that she still has ...Show more
Lupita’s hard-knock life has gotten the better of her time and time again. A childhood robbed of innocence set off a chain of events that she still has not managed to control, no matter how hard she tries. Every time she thinks she has a handle on things, unexpected turns make her question everything, including herself.
When Lupita witnesses the murder of a local politician whom she greatly admires, the ghosts of her past resurface as she tries to cope with the present. She quickly falls back into her old self-destructive habits and becomes a target of Mexico’s corrupt political machine. As the powers that be kick into high gear to ensure the truth remains hidden, Lupita finds solace in the purity of indigenous traditions. While she learns how to live simply, like her ancestors, she comes to understand herself and rediscovers light within a dark life. And if there is hope for Lupita’s redemption, perhaps there is hope for Mexico.
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Lupita’s hard-knock life has gotten the better of her time and time again. A childhood robbed of innocence set off a chain of events that she still has ...Show more
Lupita’s hard-knock life has gotten the better of her time and time again. A childhood robbed of innocence set off a chain of events that she still has not managed to control, no matter how hard she tries. Every time she thinks she has a handle on things, unexpected turns make her question everything, including herself.
When Lupita witnesses the murder of a local politician whom she greatly admires, the ghosts of her past resurface as she tries to cope with the present. She quickly falls back into her old self-destructive habits and becomes a target of Mexico’s corrupt political machine. As the powers that be kick into high gear to ensure the truth remains hidden, Lupita finds solace in the purity of indigenous traditions. While she learns how to live simply, like her ancestors, she comes to understand herself and rediscovers light within a dark life. And if there is hope for Lupita’s redemption, perhaps there is hope for Mexico.
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Book - 2015
Very little is known about Lizzie Burns, the illiterate Irishwoman and longtime lover of Frederick Engels, coauthor of The Communist Manifesto. In Gavin M...Show more
Very little is known about Lizzie Burns, the illiterate Irishwoman and longtime lover of Frederick Engels, coauthor of The Communist Manifesto. In Gavin McCrea's debut novel, Lizzie is finally given a voice that won't be forgotten.
Lizzie is a poor worker in the Manchester, England, mill that Frederick owns. When they move to London to be closer to Karl Marx and family, she must learn to navigate the complex landscapes of Victorian society. We are privy to Lizzie's intimate, wry views on Marx and Engels's mission to spur revolution among the working classes, and to her ambivalence toward her newly circumstances.
Yet despite their profound differences, Lizzie and Frederick are drawn together in this high–spirited love story.
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Very little is known about Lizzie Burns, the illiterate Irishwoman and longtime lover of Frederick Engels, coauthor of The Communist Manifesto. In Gavin M...Show more
Very little is known about Lizzie Burns, the illiterate Irishwoman and longtime lover of Frederick Engels, coauthor of The Communist Manifesto. In Gavin McCrea's debut novel, Lizzie is finally given a voice that won't be forgotten.
Lizzie is a poor worker in the Manchester, England, mill that Frederick owns. When they move to London to be closer to Karl Marx and family, she must learn to navigate the complex landscapes of Victorian society. We are privy to Lizzie's intimate, wry views on Marx and Engels's mission to spur revolution among the working classes, and to her ambivalence toward her newly circumstances.
Yet despite their profound differences, Lizzie and Frederick are drawn together in this high–spirited love story.
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Book - 2017
A pulse-pounding mystery from the author of The Gates of Evangeline featuring Charlotte “Charlie” Cates, an unforgettable heroine whose dark visions brin...Show more
A pulse-pounding mystery from the author of The Gates of Evangeline featuring Charlotte “Charlie” Cates, an unforgettable heroine whose dark visions bring to light secrets that will save or destroy those around her . . .
When soon-to-be mother Charlotte “Charlie” Cates begins to have recurring dreams about harm coming to her unborn daughter, she knows these are not the nightmares of an anxious mom-to-be. They are the result of her mysterious gift. But before she can decipher what these dreams might mean, Charlie learns that the mother who abandoned her when she was a toddler is the victim of a double murder in Arizona. The other victim—Jasmine, a half-sister Charlie never knew she had—has left behind a child, a little girl who speaks to Charlie in her dreams and was present on the night of the murders. Convinced that she must help her orphaned niece, Charlie travels to Tucson, Arizona, where she must confront her painful ties to her mother and delve into her sister’s shadowy past.
To untangle the web of secrets that will reveal the truth of her nightmares, Charlie can no longer avoid her family’s checkered history. Who is in the racy photos that turned up in Jasmine’s apartment? Where is her niece’s father, whom Jasmine was rumored to have been seeing again on the sly? Was her mother’s charity work in Mexico really as selfless as it seemed? And most important of all, what did her niece really witness on the night of the murders?
The search for answers leads Charlie across the Mexican border, from the resort town of Rocky Point to the border town of Nogales, and elucidates the meaning of her dreams in most unexpected ways. Ultimately, to protect her niece and her unborn child, Charlie must battle not just evil but the forces of nature, in one final terrifying encounter in the Tucson desert.
A thrilling mystery that combines literary suspense and romance with a mystical twist that is unputdownable. If you love Kate Atkinson and Alice Sebold, you should not miss Hester Young.
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A pulse-pounding mystery from the author of The Gates of Evangeline featuring Charlotte “Charlie” Cates, an unforgettable heroine whose dark visions brin...Show more
A pulse-pounding mystery from the author of The Gates of Evangeline featuring Charlotte “Charlie” Cates, an unforgettable heroine whose dark visions bring to light secrets that will save or destroy those around her . . .
When soon-to-be mother Charlotte “Charlie” Cates begins to have recurring dreams about harm coming to her unborn daughter, she knows these are not the nightmares of an anxious mom-to-be. They are the result of her mysterious gift. But before she can decipher what these dreams might mean, Charlie learns that the mother who abandoned her when she was a toddler is the victim of a double murder in Arizona. The other victim—Jasmine, a half-sister Charlie never knew she had—has left behind a child, a little girl who speaks to Charlie in her dreams and was present on the night of the murders. Convinced that she must help her orphaned niece, Charlie travels to Tucson, Arizona, where she must confront her painful ties to her mother and delve into her sister’s shadowy past.
To untangle the web of secrets that will reveal the truth of her nightmares, Charlie can no longer avoid her family’s checkered history. Who is in the racy photos that turned up in Jasmine’s apartment? Where is her niece’s father, whom Jasmine was rumored to have been seeing again on the sly? Was her mother’s charity work in Mexico really as selfless as it seemed? And most important of all, what did her niece really witness on the night of the murders?
The search for answers leads Charlie across the Mexican border, from the resort town of Rocky Point to the border town of Nogales, and elucidates the meaning of her dreams in most unexpected ways. Ultimately, to protect her niece and her unborn child, Charlie must battle not just evil but the forces of nature, in one final terrifying encounter in the Tucson desert.
A thrilling mystery that combines literary suspense and romance with a mystical twist that is unputdownable. If you love Kate Atkinson and Alice Sebold, you should not miss Hester Young.
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The Story of Samia Yusuf Omar
Graphic Novel - 2016
The image of Samia Yusuf Omar running for last place at the 2008 Beijing Olympics will forever be imprinted in the minds of all who saw it: The lean Soma...Show more
The image of Samia Yusuf Omar running for last place at the 2008 Beijing Olympics will forever be imprinted in the minds of all who saw it: The lean Somalian, wearing knee-length leggings and a baggy T-shirt, came in seconds behind her competitors. What the cheering crowd couldn’t know then was what it took to get there. An Olympic Dream follows Omar’s second attempt to represent her country at the Olympics, this time in London. Reinhard Kleist pictures the athlete training in one of the most dangerous cities in the world; her passage through Sudan and into Libya; and her fateful attempt to reach Europe. By telling the story of one remarkable woman, Kleist gives voice to the thousands of migrants who risk their lives daily for a better future.
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The image of Samia Yusuf Omar running for last place at the 2008 Beijing Olympics will forever be imprinted in the minds of all who saw it: The lean Soma...Show more
The image of Samia Yusuf Omar running for last place at the 2008 Beijing Olympics will forever be imprinted in the minds of all who saw it: The lean Somalian, wearing knee-length leggings and a baggy T-shirt, came in seconds behind her competitors. What the cheering crowd couldn’t know then was what it took to get there. An Olympic Dream follows Omar’s second attempt to represent her country at the Olympics, this time in London. Reinhard Kleist pictures the athlete training in one of the most dangerous cities in the world; her passage through Sudan and into Libya; and her fateful attempt to reach Europe. By telling the story of one remarkable woman, Kleist gives voice to the thousands of migrants who risk their lives daily for a better future.
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A Novel
Book - 2017
Young lovers Héctor and Lilia dream of a brighter future in the United States, but their dream turns to a nightmare when their infant daughter vanishes du...Show more
Young lovers Héctor and Lilia dream of a brighter future in the United States, but their dream turns to a nightmare when their infant daughter vanishes during the crossing from Mexico. Four years later, back in their hometown of Oaxaca, the couple have a toddler son and another baby on the way when they receive a tip that might lead to their long-lost daughter. Héctor works illegal jobs to earn money for the journey north, and a bedridden Lilia awaits the birth of their third child while obsessively reliving the worst mistakes of her past. Michel Stone gives us a raw and heart-wrenching portrait of a family strained to the breaking point by the unexpected consequences of their hopes for a better life.
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Young lovers Héctor and Lilia dream of a brighter future in the United States, but their dream turns to a nightmare when their infant daughter vanishes du...Show more
Young lovers Héctor and Lilia dream of a brighter future in the United States, but their dream turns to a nightmare when their infant daughter vanishes during the crossing from Mexico. Four years later, back in their hometown of Oaxaca, the couple have a toddler son and another baby on the way when they receive a tip that might lead to their long-lost daughter. Héctor works illegal jobs to earn money for the journey north, and a bedridden Lilia awaits the birth of their third child while obsessively reliving the worst mistakes of her past. Michel Stone gives us a raw and heart-wrenching portrait of a family strained to the breaking point by the unexpected consequences of their hopes for a better life.
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by Jones, J. G
Graphic Novel - 2017
An alien being falls to Earth during the Great Flood of 1927, destined to save a small Mississippi town from certain destruction.
In the small town of C...Show more
An alien being falls to Earth during the Great Flood of 1927, destined to save a small Mississippi town from certain destruction.
In the small town of Chatterlee, Mississippi, the Great Flood of 1927 was more than just the most catastrophic river flood in the history of the United States. It was the herald of change. While the rising river and broken levees ravaged the former plantation town from the outside, racial and social tensions tore it apart from within. But when an otherworldly being fell from the sky and challenged everything these divided people knew, it changed things . . . forever.
J.G. Jones (52, Wanted) and Mark Waid (Irredeemable, Superman: Birthright, Kingdom Come) weave a powerful, literary, fully-painted piece of historical fiction that examines the heroic myth while exploring themes of racism, cultural legacy, and human nature.
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An alien being falls to Earth during the Great Flood of 1927, destined to save a small Mississippi town from certain destruction.
In the small town of C...Show more
An alien being falls to Earth during the Great Flood of 1927, destined to save a small Mississippi town from certain destruction.
In the small town of Chatterlee, Mississippi, the Great Flood of 1927 was more than just the most catastrophic river flood in the history of the United States. It was the herald of change. While the rising river and broken levees ravaged the former plantation town from the outside, racial and social tensions tore it apart from within. But when an otherworldly being fell from the sky and challenged everything these divided people knew, it changed things . . . forever.
J.G. Jones (52, Wanted) and Mark Waid (Irredeemable, Superman: Birthright, Kingdom Come) weave a powerful, literary, fully-painted piece of historical fiction that examines the heroic myth while exploring themes of racism, cultural legacy, and human nature.
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by Roth, Philip
Book - 2008
Against the backdrop of the Korean War, a young man faces life’s unimagined chances and terrifying consequences.
It is 1951 in America, the second year o...Show more
Against the backdrop of the Korean War, a young man faces life’s unimagined chances and terrifying consequences.
It is 1951 in America, the second year of the Korean War. A studious, law-abiding, intense youngster from Newark, New Jersey, Marcus Messner, is beginning his sophomore year on the pastoral, conservative campus of Ohio’s Winesburg College. And why is he there and not at the local college in Newark where he originally enrolled? Because his father, the sturdy, hard-working neighborhood butcher, seems to have gone mad -- mad with fear and apprehension of the dangers of adult life, the dangers of the world, the dangers he sees in every corner for his beloved boy.
As the long-suffering, desperately harassed mother tells her son, the father’s fear arises from love and pride. Perhaps, but it produces too much anger in Marcus for him to endure living with his parents any longer. He leaves them and, far from Newark, in the midwestern college, has to find his way amid the customs and constrictions of another American world.
Indignation, Philip Roth’s twenty-ninth book, is a story of inexperience, foolishness, intellectual resistance, sexual discovery, courage, and error. It is a story told with all the inventive energy and wit Roth has at his command, at once a startling departure from the haunted narratives of old age and experience in his recent books and a powerful addition to his investigations of the impact of American history on the life of the vulnerable individual.
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Against the backdrop of the Korean War, a young man faces life’s unimagined chances and terrifying consequences.
It is 1951 in America, the second year o...Show more
Against the backdrop of the Korean War, a young man faces life’s unimagined chances and terrifying consequences.
It is 1951 in America, the second year of the Korean War. A studious, law-abiding, intense youngster from Newark, New Jersey, Marcus Messner, is beginning his sophomore year on the pastoral, conservative campus of Ohio’s Winesburg College. And why is he there and not at the local college in Newark where he originally enrolled? Because his father, the sturdy, hard-working neighborhood butcher, seems to have gone mad -- mad with fear and apprehension of the dangers of adult life, the dangers of the world, the dangers he sees in every corner for his beloved boy.
As the long-suffering, desperately harassed mother tells her son, the father’s fear arises from love and pride. Perhaps, but it produces too much anger in Marcus for him to endure living with his parents any longer. He leaves them and, far from Newark, in the midwestern college, has to find his way amid the customs and constrictions of another American world.
Indignation, Philip Roth’s twenty-ninth book, is a story of inexperience, foolishness, intellectual resistance, sexual discovery, courage, and error. It is a story told with all the inventive energy and wit Roth has at his command, at once a startling departure from the haunted narratives of old age and experience in his recent books and a powerful addition to his investigations of the impact of American history on the life of the vulnerable individual.
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Place hold