In his great triptych "The Millennium," Bosch used oranges and other fruits to symbolize the delights of Paradise. Views: 810
Scattered about the galaxy were the time-space Gates of a vanished but not forgotten alien race. In their time, long before the rise of the native civilizations, they had terrorized a hundred worlds—not from villainy but from folly, from tampering with the strands that held a universe together.
Now the task was to uproot these Gates, destroy their potency for mischief, take horror out of the hands of the few who hungered for power by misuse of the Gates.
This is the story of one such Gate and one such world. Views: 810
A stunning new translation—the first in more than forty years—of a major novel by the father of modern Japanese fiction
Natsume Sōseki's Kusamakura follows its nameless young artist-narrator on a meandering walking tour of the mountains. At the inn at a hot spring resort, he has a series of mysterious encounters with Nami, the lovely young daughter of the establishment. Nami, or "beauty," is the center of this elegant novel, the still point around which the artist moves and the enigmatic subject of Sōseki's word painting. In the author's words, Kusamakura is "a haiku-style novel, that lives through beauty." Written at a time when Japan was opening its doors to the rest of the world, Kusamakura turns inward, to the pristine mountain idyll and the taciturn lyricism of its courtship scenes, enshrining the essence of old Japan in a work of enchanting literary nostalgia. Views: 810
When Querry, a world-famous architect, finds he no longer enjoys life or takes pleasure in art he sets off on a voyage. Arriving anonymously at a leper colony in the Congo, he is diagnosed as the mental equivalent of a 'burnt-out case', a leper mutilated by disease and amputation. Querry slowly moves towards a cure, his mind getting clearer as he works for the colony. However, in the heat of the tropics, no relationship with a married woman, however blameless, will ever be taken as innocent. Views: 810
"Transparent Things revolves around the four visits of the hero - sullen, gawky Hugh Person - to Switzerland... As a young publisher, Hugh is sent to interview R., falls in love with Armande on the way, wrests her, after multiple humiliations, from a grinning Scandinavian and returns to NY with his bride... Eight years later - following a murder, a period of madness and a brief imprisonment - Hugh makes a lone sentimental journey to wheedle out his past... The several strands of dream, memory, and time [are] set off against the literary theorizing of R. and, more centrally, against the world of observable objects." Martin Amis Views: 810
The Sirens of Titan is an outrageous romp through space, time, and morality. The richest, most depraved man on Earth, Malachi Constant, is offered a chance to take a space journey to distant worlds with a beautiful woman at his side. Of course there's a catch to the invitation—and a prophetic vision about the purpose of human life that only Vonnegut has the courage to tell. Views: 810
The spellbinding power of RAY BRADBURY
He can make you see things
that have never been seen by human eyes....
feel things that no flesh-and-blood
creature has ever felt. He can create visions so
compelling that they literally seem to dance
before your eyes. He can push you back to the
beginnings of time and then suddenly,
without warning, thrust you forward t the outmost
limits of the future. He can make you so much
a part of his strange worlds that you
literally scream to get out.
Seventeen breathtaking stories by the
master of the weird and wonderful, including
the space-age classic, FROST AND FIRE. Views: 809
The gabion was ours. After two hours' fighting we were in possession of the first embrasure, and made ourselves as comfortable as circumstances would admit. Jack Delamere, Tom Delancy, Jerry Blake, the Doctor, and myself, sat down under a pontoon, and our servants laid out a hasty supper on a tumbrel. Though Cambaceres had escaped me so provokingly after I cut him down, his spoils were mine; a cold fowl and a Bologna sausage were found in the Marshal's holsters; and in the haversack of a French private who lay a corpse on the glacis, we found a loaf of bread, his three days' ration. Views: 809
One of the most controversial YA novels of all time, *The Chocolate War *is a modern masterpiece that speaks to fans of S. E. Hinton’s The Outsiders and John Knowles’s A Separate Peace.
After suffering rejection from seven major publishers, The Chocolate War made its debut in 1974, and quickly became a bestselling—and provocative—classic for young adults. This chilling portrait of an all-boys prep school casts an unflinching eye on the pitfalls of conformity and corruption in our most elite cultural institutions.
“Masterfully structured and rich in theme; the action is well crafted, well timed, suspenseful.”—The New York Times Book Review
“The characterizations of all the boys are superb.”—School Library Journal, starred review
“Compellingly immediate. . . . Readers will respect the uncompromising ending.”—Kirkus Reviews, starred review
An ALA Best Book for Young Adults
A School Library Journal Best Book of the Year
A Kirkus Reviews Editor’s Choice
A New York Times Outstanding Book of the Year
From the Trade Paperback edition. Views: 809
Stunning and brutally powerful, Falconer tells the story of a man named Farragut, his crime and punishment, and his struggle to remain a man in a universe bent on beating him back into childhood. Only John Cheever could deliver these grand themes with the irony, unforced eloquence, and exhilarating humor that make Falconer such a triumphant work of the moral imagination.
From the Trade Paperback edition. Views: 809
Harlan Ellison's suspense anthology: 15 stories and one wild, 32-page introduction. Some tales, such as "Toe the Line" and "Ormond Always Pays His Bills," are simple pulp crime yarns; others are masterful examples of psychological terror and, in the case of "Whipped Dogs," mystical fantasy. Excellent. Originally published in 1975.
Contents:
9 · Blood/Thoughts · in
41 · The Whimper of Whipped Dogs · ss Bad Moon Rising, ed. Thomas M. Disch, Harper & Row, 1973
61 · Eddie, You’re My Friend [as by Jay Solo] · ss The Saint Detective Magazine (UK) Mar ’65
67 · Status Quo at Troyden’s · ss The Saint Detective Magazine Nov ’58
81 · Nedra at f:5.6 [revised from “The Hungry One”] · ss Gent Feb ’57
91 · Opposites Attract [“Mad Bomber”] · ss Caper Nov ’57
103 · Toe the Line · ss The Saint Detective Magazine Jun ’57
113 · Down in the Dark [as by Ellis Hart] · ss Adam Bedside Reader #30 ’67
123 · Pride in the Profession · ss Adam Aug ’66
137 · The Children’s Hour [as by Wallace Edmondson] · ss Fantastic Universe Jul ’58
145 · White Trash Don’t Exist [“Murder Bait”] · ss Mantrap Oct ’56
159 · Thicker Than Blood · ss Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine Feb ’58
169 · Two Inches in Tomorrow’s Column [as by Ellis Hart] · ss Adam Bedside Reader #21 ’65
177 · Promises of Laughter · ss Adam Nov ’69
187 · Ormond Always Pays His Bills · ss Pursued Jul ’57
193 · The Man on the Juice Wagon [as by Cordwainer Bird] · ss Adam Bedside Reader #14 ’63
211 · Tired Old Man · ss Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine Jan ’76 Views: 809
The only annotated edition of M. R. James's writings currently available, Count Magnus and Other Ghost Stories contains the entire first two volumes of James's ghost stories, Ghost Stories of an Antiquary and More Ghost Stories of an Antiquary. These volumes are both the culmination of the nineteenth-century ghost story tradition and the inspiration for much of the best twentieth-century work in this genre. Included in this collection are such landmark tales as "Count Magnus," set in the wilds of Sweden; "Number 13," a distinctive tale about a haunted hotel room; "Casting the Runes," a richly complex tale of sorcery that served as the basis for the classic horror film Curse of the Demon; and "Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad," one of the most frightening tales in literature. The appendix includes several rare texts, including "A Night in King's College Chapel," James's first known ghost story. Views: 808
Set in Mississippi during the Civil War and Reconstruction, THE UNVANQUISHED focuses on the Sartoris family, who, with their code of personal responsibility and courage, stand for the best of the Old South's traditions.
From the Trade Paperback edition. Views: 808
Philip K. Dick's searing metaphysical comedy of death and salvation is a tour de force of panoramic menace and unfettered slapstick, in which the departed give business advice, shop for their next incarnation, and run the continual risk of dying yet again.
From the Trade Paperback edition Views: 808
The hijacking of a jumbo jet off the Seychelles galvanises anti-terrorist chief Peter Stride into the action for which he has spent a lifetime training. But even in the hail of bullets which follows, he knows this is the beginning of a nightmare. Views: 807
