Author: Amanda Lee Koe
Publisher: Anchor
ISBN: 0385544359
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 395
Book Description
An NPR Best Book of the Year A dazzling debut novel following the lives of three groundbreaking women--Marlene Dietrich, Anna May Wong, and Leni Riefenstahl--cinema legends who lit up the twentieth century At a chance encounter at a Berlin soirée in 1928, the photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt captures three very different women together in one frame: up-and-coming German actress Marlene Dietrich, who would wend her way into Hollywood as one of its lasting icons; Anna May Wong, the world's first Chinese American star, playing bit parts while dreaming of breaking away from her father's modest laundry; and Leni Riefenstahl, whose work as a director of propaganda art films would first make her famous--then, infamous. From this curious point of intersection, Delayed Rays of a Star lets loose the trajectories of these women's lives. From Weimar Berlin to LA's Chinatown, from a bucolic village in the Bavarian Alps to a luxury apartment on the Champs-Élysées, the different settings they inhabit are as richly textured as the roles they play: siren, victim, predator, or lover, each one a carefully calibrated performance. And in the orbit of each star live secondary players--a Chinese immigrant housemaid, a German soldier on leave from North Africa, a pompous Hollywood director--whose voices and viewpoints reveal the legacy each woman left in her own time, as well as in ours. Amanda Lee Koe's playful, wry prose guides the reader dexterously around murky questions of identity, complicity, desire, and difference. Intimate and clear-eyed, Delayed Rays of a Star is a visceral depiction of womanhood--its particular hungers, its oblique calculations, and its eventual betrayals--and announces a bold new literary voice.
Delayed Rays of a Star
Author: Amanda Lee Koe
Publisher: Anchor
ISBN: 0385544359
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 395
Book Description
An NPR Best Book of the Year A dazzling debut novel following the lives of three groundbreaking women--Marlene Dietrich, Anna May Wong, and Leni Riefenstahl--cinema legends who lit up the twentieth century At a chance encounter at a Berlin soirée in 1928, the photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt captures three very different women together in one frame: up-and-coming German actress Marlene Dietrich, who would wend her way into Hollywood as one of its lasting icons; Anna May Wong, the world's first Chinese American star, playing bit parts while dreaming of breaking away from her father's modest laundry; and Leni Riefenstahl, whose work as a director of propaganda art films would first make her famous--then, infamous. From this curious point of intersection, Delayed Rays of a Star lets loose the trajectories of these women's lives. From Weimar Berlin to LA's Chinatown, from a bucolic village in the Bavarian Alps to a luxury apartment on the Champs-Élysées, the different settings they inhabit are as richly textured as the roles they play: siren, victim, predator, or lover, each one a carefully calibrated performance. And in the orbit of each star live secondary players--a Chinese immigrant housemaid, a German soldier on leave from North Africa, a pompous Hollywood director--whose voices and viewpoints reveal the legacy each woman left in her own time, as well as in ours. Amanda Lee Koe's playful, wry prose guides the reader dexterously around murky questions of identity, complicity, desire, and difference. Intimate and clear-eyed, Delayed Rays of a Star is a visceral depiction of womanhood--its particular hungers, its oblique calculations, and its eventual betrayals--and announces a bold new literary voice.
Publisher: Anchor
ISBN: 0385544359
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 395
Book Description
An NPR Best Book of the Year A dazzling debut novel following the lives of three groundbreaking women--Marlene Dietrich, Anna May Wong, and Leni Riefenstahl--cinema legends who lit up the twentieth century At a chance encounter at a Berlin soirée in 1928, the photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt captures three very different women together in one frame: up-and-coming German actress Marlene Dietrich, who would wend her way into Hollywood as one of its lasting icons; Anna May Wong, the world's first Chinese American star, playing bit parts while dreaming of breaking away from her father's modest laundry; and Leni Riefenstahl, whose work as a director of propaganda art films would first make her famous--then, infamous. From this curious point of intersection, Delayed Rays of a Star lets loose the trajectories of these women's lives. From Weimar Berlin to LA's Chinatown, from a bucolic village in the Bavarian Alps to a luxury apartment on the Champs-Élysées, the different settings they inhabit are as richly textured as the roles they play: siren, victim, predator, or lover, each one a carefully calibrated performance. And in the orbit of each star live secondary players--a Chinese immigrant housemaid, a German soldier on leave from North Africa, a pompous Hollywood director--whose voices and viewpoints reveal the legacy each woman left in her own time, as well as in ours. Amanda Lee Koe's playful, wry prose guides the reader dexterously around murky questions of identity, complicity, desire, and difference. Intimate and clear-eyed, Delayed Rays of a Star is a visceral depiction of womanhood--its particular hungers, its oblique calculations, and its eventual betrayals--and announces a bold new literary voice.
Microverses
Author: Dylan Riley
Publisher: Verso Books
ISBN: 183976841X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 153
Book Description
Microverses comprises over a hundred short essays inviting us to think about society - and social theory - in new ways. Lockdown created the conditions for what Adorno once termed 'enforced contemplation'. Dylan Riley responded with the tools of his trade, producing an extraordinary trail of notes exploring how critical sociology can speak to this troubled decade. Microverses analyses the intellectual situation, the political crisis of Trump's last months in office, and love and illness in a period when both were fraught with the public emergency of the coronavirus. Riley brings the theoretical canon to bear on problems of intellectual culture and everyday life, working through Weber and Durkheim, Parsons and Dubois, Gramsci and Lukcs, MacKinnon and Fraser, to weigh sociology's relationship to Marxism and the operations of class, race and gender, alongside discursions into the workings of an orchestra and the complicatedness of taking a walk in a pandemic. Invitations rather than finished arguments, the notes attempt to recover the totalising perspective of sociology - the ability to see society in the round, as though from the outside - and to recuperate what Paul Sweezy described as a sense of the 'present as history'.
Publisher: Verso Books
ISBN: 183976841X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 153
Book Description
Microverses comprises over a hundred short essays inviting us to think about society - and social theory - in new ways. Lockdown created the conditions for what Adorno once termed 'enforced contemplation'. Dylan Riley responded with the tools of his trade, producing an extraordinary trail of notes exploring how critical sociology can speak to this troubled decade. Microverses analyses the intellectual situation, the political crisis of Trump's last months in office, and love and illness in a period when both were fraught with the public emergency of the coronavirus. Riley brings the theoretical canon to bear on problems of intellectual culture and everyday life, working through Weber and Durkheim, Parsons and Dubois, Gramsci and Lukcs, MacKinnon and Fraser, to weigh sociology's relationship to Marxism and the operations of class, race and gender, alongside discursions into the workings of an orchestra and the complicatedness of taking a walk in a pandemic. Invitations rather than finished arguments, the notes attempt to recover the totalising perspective of sociology - the ability to see society in the round, as though from the outside - and to recuperate what Paul Sweezy described as a sense of the 'present as history'.
B: A Year in Plagues and Pencils
Author: Edward Carey
Publisher: Gallic Books
ISBN: 1913547256
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 359
Book Description
Author and illustrator Edward Carey presents a paean to connection at a time of isolation: a year of daily lockdown drawings posted on social media from his home in Texas. 'This book contains magic' A.L. Kennedy In March 2020, as lockdowns were imposed around the world, author and illustrator Edward Carey published a sketch on social media with a plan to keep posting a drawing a day from his family home in Austin, Texas, until life returned to normal. One hundred and fifty pencil stubs later, he was still drawing. Carey's hand moved with world events, chronicling pandemic and politics. It reached into the past, taking inspiration from history, and escaped grim reality through flights of vivid imagination and studies of the natural world. The drawings became a way of charting time, of moving forward, and maintaining connection at a time of isolation. This remarkable collection of words and drawings from the acclaimed author of Little and The Swallowed Man charts a tumultuous year in pencil, finding beauty amid the horror of extraordinary times.
Publisher: Gallic Books
ISBN: 1913547256
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 359
Book Description
Author and illustrator Edward Carey presents a paean to connection at a time of isolation: a year of daily lockdown drawings posted on social media from his home in Texas. 'This book contains magic' A.L. Kennedy In March 2020, as lockdowns were imposed around the world, author and illustrator Edward Carey published a sketch on social media with a plan to keep posting a drawing a day from his family home in Austin, Texas, until life returned to normal. One hundred and fifty pencil stubs later, he was still drawing. Carey's hand moved with world events, chronicling pandemic and politics. It reached into the past, taking inspiration from history, and escaped grim reality through flights of vivid imagination and studies of the natural world. The drawings became a way of charting time, of moving forward, and maintaining connection at a time of isolation. This remarkable collection of words and drawings from the acclaimed author of Little and The Swallowed Man charts a tumultuous year in pencil, finding beauty amid the horror of extraordinary times.
Sisters of the Vine
Author: Linda Rosen
Publisher: Black Rose Writing
ISBN: 1684336708
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 231
Book Description
Housewife and mother with a loving husband to take care of her - that's all Liz, a Fifties gal, ever wanted. Over her father's objections, she drops out of college to marry Rick, who dreams of living off the land. They buy a farm on a verdant hillside in the Hudson Valley, but can't agree on what to plant. When they discover French-American hybrid grapes, Liz is confident they'll be happy. Grapes are classy. As the rich soil sinks into her soul and the vines begin to thrive, the marriage grows rocky. Refusing to disappoint her father again, Liz is determined to make her marriage work . . . until she discovers a photograph hidden in the old barn. Faced with impossible decisions, Liz is desperate. She has a vineyard ready to harvest and no idea how to accomplish the task. Does she have the moxie to flourish? Or will she and the land turn fallow?
Publisher: Black Rose Writing
ISBN: 1684336708
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 231
Book Description
Housewife and mother with a loving husband to take care of her - that's all Liz, a Fifties gal, ever wanted. Over her father's objections, she drops out of college to marry Rick, who dreams of living off the land. They buy a farm on a verdant hillside in the Hudson Valley, but can't agree on what to plant. When they discover French-American hybrid grapes, Liz is confident they'll be happy. Grapes are classy. As the rich soil sinks into her soul and the vines begin to thrive, the marriage grows rocky. Refusing to disappoint her father again, Liz is determined to make her marriage work . . . until she discovers a photograph hidden in the old barn. Faced with impossible decisions, Liz is desperate. She has a vineyard ready to harvest and no idea how to accomplish the task. Does she have the moxie to flourish? Or will she and the land turn fallow?
These Precious Days
Author: Ann Patchett
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0063092808
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 320
Book Description
The beloved New York Times bestselling author reflects on home, family, friendships and writing in this deeply personal collection of essays. "The elegance of Patchett’s prose is seductive and inviting: with Patchett as a guide, readers will really get to grips with the power of struggles, failures, and triumphs alike." —Publisher's Weekly “Any story that starts will also end.” As a writer, Ann Patchett knows what the outcome of her fiction will be. Life, however, often takes turns we do not see coming. Patchett ponders this truth in these wise essays that afford a fresh and intimate look into her mind and heart. At the center of These Precious Days is the title essay, a surprising and moving meditation on an unexpected friendship that explores “what it means to be seen, to find someone with whom you can be your best and most complete self.” When Patchett chose an early galley of actor and producer Tom Hanks’ short story collection to read one night before bed, she had no idea that this single choice would be life changing. It would introduce her to a remarkable woman—Tom’s brilliant assistant Sooki—with whom she would form a profound bond that held monumental consequences for them both. A literary alchemist, Patchett plumbs the depths of her experiences to create gold: engaging and moving pieces that are both self-portrait and landscape, each vibrant with emotion and rich in insight. Turning her writer’s eye on her own experiences, she transforms the private into the universal, providing us all a way to look at our own worlds anew, and reminds how fleeting and enigmatic life can be. From the enchantments of Kate DiCamillo’s children’s books (author of The Beatryce Prophecy) to youthful memories of Paris; the cherished life gifts given by her three fathers to the unexpected influence of Charles Schultz’s Snoopy; the expansive vision of Eudora Welty to the importance of knitting, Patchett connects life and art as she illuminates what matters most. Infused with the author’s grace, wit, and warmth, the pieces in These Precious Days resonate deep in the soul, leaving an indelible mark—and demonstrate why Ann Patchett is one of the most celebrated writers of our time.
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0063092808
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 320
Book Description
The beloved New York Times bestselling author reflects on home, family, friendships and writing in this deeply personal collection of essays. "The elegance of Patchett’s prose is seductive and inviting: with Patchett as a guide, readers will really get to grips with the power of struggles, failures, and triumphs alike." —Publisher's Weekly “Any story that starts will also end.” As a writer, Ann Patchett knows what the outcome of her fiction will be. Life, however, often takes turns we do not see coming. Patchett ponders this truth in these wise essays that afford a fresh and intimate look into her mind and heart. At the center of These Precious Days is the title essay, a surprising and moving meditation on an unexpected friendship that explores “what it means to be seen, to find someone with whom you can be your best and most complete self.” When Patchett chose an early galley of actor and producer Tom Hanks’ short story collection to read one night before bed, she had no idea that this single choice would be life changing. It would introduce her to a remarkable woman—Tom’s brilliant assistant Sooki—with whom she would form a profound bond that held monumental consequences for them both. A literary alchemist, Patchett plumbs the depths of her experiences to create gold: engaging and moving pieces that are both self-portrait and landscape, each vibrant with emotion and rich in insight. Turning her writer’s eye on her own experiences, she transforms the private into the universal, providing us all a way to look at our own worlds anew, and reminds how fleeting and enigmatic life can be. From the enchantments of Kate DiCamillo’s children’s books (author of The Beatryce Prophecy) to youthful memories of Paris; the cherished life gifts given by her three fathers to the unexpected influence of Charles Schultz’s Snoopy; the expansive vision of Eudora Welty to the importance of knitting, Patchett connects life and art as she illuminates what matters most. Infused with the author’s grace, wit, and warmth, the pieces in These Precious Days resonate deep in the soul, leaving an indelible mark—and demonstrate why Ann Patchett is one of the most celebrated writers of our time.
Kaleidoscopic Life
Author: Chandidas Mohanty
Publisher: The Write Order Publication
ISBN: 9360450561
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 308
Book Description
Join Chandidas Mohanty on an extraordinary journey through time in his remarkable memoir, "Kaleidoscopic Life." At 88 years young, Mohanty has penned a captivating account of his rich and eventful existence, inviting readers to relive a lifetime of treasured memories. From the humble beginnings of his parents' lives and their heartwarming union, Mohanty paints a vivid portrait of a bygone era. He shares the joys and challenges of his own birth and the arrival of his siblings, weaving a tapestry of familial love and resilience. With meticulous attention to detail, Mohanty chronicles his odyssey, from the blissful moments of his marriage to navigating the labyrinth of life as a dedicated official. Readers will be drawn into the world of his children, sharing in their growth and educational pursuits, while gaining insight into the values and traditions that shaped his family.
Publisher: The Write Order Publication
ISBN: 9360450561
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 308
Book Description
Join Chandidas Mohanty on an extraordinary journey through time in his remarkable memoir, "Kaleidoscopic Life." At 88 years young, Mohanty has penned a captivating account of his rich and eventful existence, inviting readers to relive a lifetime of treasured memories. From the humble beginnings of his parents' lives and their heartwarming union, Mohanty paints a vivid portrait of a bygone era. He shares the joys and challenges of his own birth and the arrival of his siblings, weaving a tapestry of familial love and resilience. With meticulous attention to detail, Mohanty chronicles his odyssey, from the blissful moments of his marriage to navigating the labyrinth of life as a dedicated official. Readers will be drawn into the world of his children, sharing in their growth and educational pursuits, while gaining insight into the values and traditions that shaped his family.
Surviving Our Catastrophes
Author: Robert Jay Lifton
Publisher: The New Press
ISBN: 1620978296
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 79
Book Description
From the National Book Award winner, a powerful and timely rumination on how we can draw on historical examples of “survivor power” to understand the upheaval and death caused by the COVID-19 pandemic—and collectively heal "Lifton shows us why we must confront reality in order to save democracy." —Peter Balakian, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Ozone Journal In this moving and ultimately hopeful meditation on the psychological aftermath of catastrophe, award-winning psychiatrist Robert Jay Lifton calls forth his life’s work to show us how to cope with the lasting effects and legacy of the COVID-19 pandemic. The result is a thought-provoking examination of life in the face of COVID-19 from one of the most profound thinkers of our time. When the people of Hiroshima experienced the unspeakable horror of the atomic bombing, they responded by creating an activist “city of peace.” Survivors of the Nazi death camps took the lead in combating mass killing of any kind and converted their experience into art and literature that demonstrated the resilience of the human spirit. Drawing on the remarkably life-affirming responses of survivors of such atrocities, Lifton, “one of the world’s foremost thinkers on why we humans do such awful things to each other” (Bill Moyers), shows readers how we can carry on and live meaningful lives even in the face of the tragic and the absurd. Surviving Our Catastrophes offers compelling examples of “survivor power” and makes clear that we will not move forward by denying the true extent of the pandemic’s destruction. Instead, we must truly reckon with COVID-19’s effects on ourselves and society—and find individual and collective forms of renewal.
Publisher: The New Press
ISBN: 1620978296
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 79
Book Description
From the National Book Award winner, a powerful and timely rumination on how we can draw on historical examples of “survivor power” to understand the upheaval and death caused by the COVID-19 pandemic—and collectively heal "Lifton shows us why we must confront reality in order to save democracy." —Peter Balakian, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Ozone Journal In this moving and ultimately hopeful meditation on the psychological aftermath of catastrophe, award-winning psychiatrist Robert Jay Lifton calls forth his life’s work to show us how to cope with the lasting effects and legacy of the COVID-19 pandemic. The result is a thought-provoking examination of life in the face of COVID-19 from one of the most profound thinkers of our time. When the people of Hiroshima experienced the unspeakable horror of the atomic bombing, they responded by creating an activist “city of peace.” Survivors of the Nazi death camps took the lead in combating mass killing of any kind and converted their experience into art and literature that demonstrated the resilience of the human spirit. Drawing on the remarkably life-affirming responses of survivors of such atrocities, Lifton, “one of the world’s foremost thinkers on why we humans do such awful things to each other” (Bill Moyers), shows readers how we can carry on and live meaningful lives even in the face of the tragic and the absurd. Surviving Our Catastrophes offers compelling examples of “survivor power” and makes clear that we will not move forward by denying the true extent of the pandemic’s destruction. Instead, we must truly reckon with COVID-19’s effects on ourselves and society—and find individual and collective forms of renewal.
Wife | Daughter | Self
Author: Beth Kephart
Publisher: Forest Avenue Press
ISBN: 1942436459
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 193
Book Description
Wife | Daughter | Self investigates identity and the writing life through the perspective of one of the nation’s top memoir teachers and critics. How are we shaped by the people we love? Who are we when we think no one else is watching? How do we trust the choices we make? The answers shift as the years go by. The stories remake themselves as we remember. Curiously, inventively, Beth Kephart reflects on the iterative, composite self in her new memoir—traveling to lakes and rivers, New Mexico and Mexico, the icy waters of Alaska and a hot-air balloon launch in search of understanding. She is accompanied, often, by her Salvadoran-artist husband. She spends time, a lot of time, with her widowed father. As she looks at them she ponders herself and comes to terms with the person she is still becoming. At once sweeping and intimate, Wife | Daughter | Self is a memoir built of interlocking essays by an acclaimed author, teacher, and critic.
Publisher: Forest Avenue Press
ISBN: 1942436459
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 193
Book Description
Wife | Daughter | Self investigates identity and the writing life through the perspective of one of the nation’s top memoir teachers and critics. How are we shaped by the people we love? Who are we when we think no one else is watching? How do we trust the choices we make? The answers shift as the years go by. The stories remake themselves as we remember. Curiously, inventively, Beth Kephart reflects on the iterative, composite self in her new memoir—traveling to lakes and rivers, New Mexico and Mexico, the icy waters of Alaska and a hot-air balloon launch in search of understanding. She is accompanied, often, by her Salvadoran-artist husband. She spends time, a lot of time, with her widowed father. As she looks at them she ponders herself and comes to terms with the person she is still becoming. At once sweeping and intimate, Wife | Daughter | Self is a memoir built of interlocking essays by an acclaimed author, teacher, and critic.
The Gift of an Ordinary Day
Author: Katrina Kenison
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
ISBN: 0446558095
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 210
Book Description
The Gift of an Ordinary Day is an intimate memoir of a family in transition, with boys becoming teenagers, careers ending and new ones opening up, and an attempt to find a deeper sense of place—and a slower pace—in a small New England town. This is a story of mid-life longings and discoveries, of lessons learned in the search for home and a new sense of purpose, and the bittersweet intensity of life with teenagers—holding on, letting go. Poised on the threshold between family life as she's always known it and her older son's departure for college, Kenison is surprised to find that the times she treasures most are the ordinary, unremarkable moments of everyday life, the very moments that she once took for granted, or rushed right through without noticing at all. The relationships, hopes, and dreams that Kenison illuminates will touch women's hearts, and her words will inspire mothers everywhere as they try to make peace with the inevitable changes in store.
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
ISBN: 0446558095
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 210
Book Description
The Gift of an Ordinary Day is an intimate memoir of a family in transition, with boys becoming teenagers, careers ending and new ones opening up, and an attempt to find a deeper sense of place—and a slower pace—in a small New England town. This is a story of mid-life longings and discoveries, of lessons learned in the search for home and a new sense of purpose, and the bittersweet intensity of life with teenagers—holding on, letting go. Poised on the threshold between family life as she's always known it and her older son's departure for college, Kenison is surprised to find that the times she treasures most are the ordinary, unremarkable moments of everyday life, the very moments that she once took for granted, or rushed right through without noticing at all. The relationships, hopes, and dreams that Kenison illuminates will touch women's hearts, and her words will inspire mothers everywhere as they try to make peace with the inevitable changes in store.
The Genius Factor: How to Capture an Invisible Cat
Author: Paul Tobin
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1408869985
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 272
Book Description
Every Friday the 13th, 6th-grade genius Nate Bannister does three not-so-smart things to keep life interesting. This time, he taught a caterpillar to read, mailed a love letter, and super-sized his cat Proton before turning him invisible. Now Proton is on the loose, and Nate and his new friend Delphine must reverse the experiment before the cat crushes everything and everybody in town. As if that's not enough, the Red Death Tea Society, known for its criminal activity, killer tactics, and tea-brewing skills, is plotting against Nate and Delphine. The dynamic duo must use their creativity, courage and friendship to save the day. Paul Tobin blends wacky humour and chaotic high jinks in this rip-roaring, action-packed middle-grade debut;perfect for fans of David Walliams and Tom Gates.
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1408869985
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 272
Book Description
Every Friday the 13th, 6th-grade genius Nate Bannister does three not-so-smart things to keep life interesting. This time, he taught a caterpillar to read, mailed a love letter, and super-sized his cat Proton before turning him invisible. Now Proton is on the loose, and Nate and his new friend Delphine must reverse the experiment before the cat crushes everything and everybody in town. As if that's not enough, the Red Death Tea Society, known for its criminal activity, killer tactics, and tea-brewing skills, is plotting against Nate and Delphine. The dynamic duo must use their creativity, courage and friendship to save the day. Paul Tobin blends wacky humour and chaotic high jinks in this rip-roaring, action-packed middle-grade debut;perfect for fans of David Walliams and Tom Gates.