Mark Doty brings the vitality and imagination that illuminate his own work to his selections for the twenty-fifth volume in the Best American Poetry series. He has chosen poems of high moral earnestness and poems in a comic register; poems that tell stories and poems that test the boundaries of innovative composition. This landmark edition includes David Lehman's keen look at American poetry in his foreword, Mark Doty's gorgeous introduction, and notes from the poets revealing the germination of their work. Over the last twenty-five years, The Best American Poetry has become an annual rite of the poetry world, and this year's anthology is a welcome and essential addition to the series. SHERMAN ALEXIE * KAREN LEONA ANDERSON * RAE ARMANTROUT * JULIANNA BAGGOTT * DAVID BAKER * RICK BAROTt REGINALD DWAYNE BETTS * FRANK BIDART * BRUCE BOND * STEPHANIE BROWN * ANNE CARSON * JENNIFER CHANG * JOSEPH CHAPMAN * HEATHER CHRISTLE * HENRI COLE * BILLY COLLINS * PETER COOLEY *... Views: 54
Get ready to laugh out loud, swoon, and fall in love with this new, fun, and sexy stand-alone novel from New York Times bestselling author Aleatha Romig. Demonstrating her versatility in writing, Aleatha revisits her lighter side that you loved in PLUS ONE. A complete stand-alone, ANOTHER ONE is the next big summer hit. *Shana* Trevor Willis is sexy, sweet, and oh so fun. He's also my best friend's brother-in-law. That should mean he's off-limits, or that I should be off-limits to him. Someone probably should have told us that before my best friend married his brother, before the morning of the wedding when we woke in each other's arms with gaping holes in my memory. They didn't. We did. The hilarious truth behind our crazy, secret adventure secured this handsome, off-limits man in my heart. But alas, life goes on. After our one secret night, we went back to our lives—our hardworking,... Views: 54
THE HUNTER BECOMES PREY...
U.S. Marshal Sebastian Falconer was a workaholic, dedicated to catching
dangerous fugitives. But when his wife became the victim of a vengeful
escaped felon who had vowed to destroy Sebastian, he knew he could no
longer protect his beloved Olivia from the dark side of his job.
Olivia's amnesia made her wary of the raven-haired man who called
himself her husband. Was she attracted to the handsome stranger because
of a need for security or a true calling of her heart? She joined in the
search for her attacker, proving she wasn't as fragile as Sebastian had
once thought. But could they find a way to rekindle their lost love in
the face of danger? Views: 54
It seems a long way from Molière to Ray Cooney.There are immense distances between the worlds of Aristophanes, Plautus, Georges Feydeau, Ben Travers, Joe Orton and Basil Fawlty. But as one of the oldest genres in the history of the theatre, farce bridges the gaps by generating gales of helpless belly laughter across the generations.Inspired by John Mortimer's observation that farce is 'tragedy played at a thousand revolutions a minute', Roger Foss embarks on a lightning tour of the rib-tickling world of confused characters, absurd situations, ruined reputations, sexual innuendo and bravura comic acting and finds out if farce really is a force to be reckoned with in the 21st century.The great creators and performers of farce are celebrated, most notably master farceur Ray Cooney, who celebrates his 80th birthday in 2012, in essays that will inform and entertain both the aficionado and anyone with a sense of humour. Views: 54
"To you, perceptive reader, I bequeath my history…" Late one night, exploring her father's library, a young woman finds an ancient book and a cache of yellowing letters. The letters are all addressed to "My dear and unfortunate successor," and they plunge her into a world she never dreamed of-a labyrinth where the secrets of her father's past and her mother's mysterious fate connect to an inconceivable evil hidden in the depths of history. The letters provide links to one of the darkest powers that humanity has ever known-and to a centuries-long quest to find the source of that darkness and wipe it out. It is a quest for the truth about Vlad the Impaler, the medieval ruler whose barbarous reign formed the basis of the legend of Dracula. Generations of historians have risked their reputations, their sanity, and even their lives to learn the truth about Vlad the Impaler and Dracula. Now one young woman must decide whether to take up this quest herself-to follow her father in a hunt that nearly brought him to ruin years ago, when he was a vibrant young scholar and her mother was still alive. What does the legend of Vlad the Impaler have to do with the modern world? Is it possible that the Dracula of myth truly existed-and that he has lived on, century after century, pursuing his own unknowable ends? The answers to these questions cross time and borders, as first the father and then the daughter search for clues, from dusty Ivy League libraries to Istanbul, Budapest, and the depths of Eastern Europe. In city after city, in monasteries and archives, in letters and in secret conversations, the horrible truth emerges about Vlad the Impaler's dark reign-and about a time-defying pact that may have kept his awful work alive down through the ages. Parsing obscure signs and hidden texts, reading codes worked into the fabric of medieval monastic traditions-and evading the unknown adversaries who will go to any lengths to conceal and protect Vlad's ancient powers-one woman comes ever closer to the secret of her own past and a confrontation with the very definition of evil. Elizabeth Kostova's debut novel is an adventure of monumental proportions, a relentless tale that blends fact and fantasy, history and the present, with an assurance that is almost unbearably suspenseful-and utterly unforgettable. Amazon.com Review If your pulse flutters at the thought of castle ruins and descents into crypts by moonlight, you will savor every creepy page of Elizabeth Kostova's long but beautifully structured thriller The Historian. The story opens in Amsterdam in 1972, when a teenage girl discovers a medieval book and a cache of yellowed letters in her diplomat father's library. The pages of the book are empty except for a woodcut of a dragon. The letters are addressed to: "My dear and unfortunate successor." When the girl confronts her father, he reluctantly confesses an unsettling story: his involvement, twenty years earlier, in a search for his graduate school mentor, who disappeared from his office only moments after confiding to Paul his certainty that Dracula-Vlad the Impaler, an inventively cruel ruler of Wallachia in the mid-15th century-was still alive. The story turns out to concern our narrator directly because Paul's collaborator in the search was a fellow student named Helen Rossi (the unacknowledged daughter of his mentor) and our narrator's long-dead mother, about whom she knows almost nothing. And then her father, leaving just a note, disappears also. As well as numerous settings, both in and out of the East Bloc, Kostova has three basic story lines to keep straight-one from 1930, when Professor Bartolomew Rossi begins his dangerous research into Dracula, one from 1950, when Professor Rossi's student Paul takes up the scent, and the main narrative from 1972. The criss-crossing story lines mirror the political advances, retreats, triumphs, and losses that shaped Dracula's beleaguered homeland-sometimes with the Byzantines on top, sometimes the Ottomans, sometimes the rag-tag local tribes, or the Orthodox church, and sometimes a fresh conqueror like the Soviet Union. Although the book is appropriately suspenseful and a delight to read-even the minor characters are distinctive and vividly seen-its most powerful moments are those that describe real horrors. Our narrator recalls that after reading descriptions of Vlad burning young boys or impaling "a large family," she tried to forget the words: "For all his attention to my historical education, my father had neglected to tell me this: history's terrible moments were real. I understand now, decades later, that he could never have told me. Only history itself can convince you of such a truth." The reader, although given a satisfying ending, gets a strong enough dose of European history to temper the usual comforts of the closing words. From Publishers Weekly Starred Review. Considering the recent rush of door-stopping historical novels, first-timer Kostova is getting a big launch-fortunately, a lot here lives up to the hype. In 1972, a 16-year-old American living in Amsterdam finds a mysterious book in her diplomat father's library. The book is ancient, blank except for a sinister woodcut of a dragon and the word "Drakulya," but it's the letters tucked inside, dated 1930 and addressed to "My dear and unfortunate successor," that really pique her curiosity. Her widowed father, Paul, reluctantly provides pieces of a chilling story; it seems this ominous little book has a way of forcing itself on its owners, with terrifying results. Paul's former adviser at Oxford, Professor Rossi, became obsessed with researching Dracula and was convinced that he remained alive. When Rossi disappeared, Paul continued his quest with the help of another scholar, Helen, who had her own reasons for seeking the truth. As Paul relates these stories to his daughter, she secretly begins her own research. Kostova builds suspense by revealing the threads of her story as the narrator discovers them: what she's told, what she reads in old letters and, of course, what she discovers directly when the legendary threat of Dracula looms. Along with all the fascinating historical information, there's also a mounting casualty count, and the big showdown amps up the drama by pulling at the heartstrings at the same time it revels in the gruesome. Exotic locales, tantalizing history, a family legacy and a love of the bloodthirsty: it's hard to imagine that readers won't be bitten, too. Views: 54
Three high school students—Eric, Shelly, and Fatima—have one thing in common: "I know your secret." Each one is blackmailed into bullying specifically targeted schoolmates by a mysterious caller who whispers from their cell phones and holds carefully guarded secrets over their heads. But how could anyone have obtained that photo, read those hidden pages, uncovered this buried past? Thrown together, the three teens join forces to find the stranger who threatens them—before time runs out and their shattering secrets are revealed . . . This suspenseful, pitch-perfect mystery-thriller raises timely questions about privacy, bullying, and culpability. Views: 54
After the death of her father, Kathryn must go to live with her Aunt Belle in Alberta. Arriving at Buffalo Hills, Kathryn is horrified to learn her new home is a group of shacks called River Falls, a Métis community. Never having known her true heritage, Kathryn is further shocked to discover it's not even a permanent home. Barred from owning land, the Métis must find a way to live in the road allowances, or ditches – the strips of government land between the public highway and the private properties of recognized citizens. Excitement comes in the form of a mysterious stranger known as the Highwayman, a shadowy Robin Hood figure who rights wrongs against the Métis people in his own way. When he is framed for a crime he did not commit, and Aunt Belle becomes involved, Kathryn must use all her resources to prove their innocence – and challenge the deep-seated beliefs of an entire community. Set in 1901,Outcasts of River Falls is the sequel to the award-winning Belle... Views: 54
This collection is the first comprehensive, cohesive volume to unite Appalachian history with its culture. Richard A. Straw and H. Tyler Blethen's High Mountains Rising provides a clear, systematic, and engaging overview of the Appalachian timeline, its people, and the most significant aspects of life in the region. The first half of the fourteen essays deal with historical issues including Native Americans, pioneer settlement, slavery, the Civil War and Reconstruction, industrialization, the Great Depression, migration, and finally, modernization. The remaining essays take a more cultural focus, addressing stereotypes, music, folklife, language, literature, and religion. Bringing together many of the most prestigious scholars in Appalachian studies, this volume has been designed for general and classroom use, and includes suggestions for further reading. Views: 54
At the pinnacle of this demanding sport, artistry and balance is found in two moving as one. Yet the world's best pair of acrobats dare not reveal that their athletic brilliance has come at the price of their very identities.At the publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management software (DRM) applied. Views: 54
Camille Dupree hoped to leave her shocking past behind when she moved to Willow Grove, Texas. She soon learned a good heart was a valued commodity and grew to admire the town's mayor, Tyler McKinnon, who helped her become a respectable businesswoman. But when her hard-won acceptance was threatened, Camille found she needed the town's forgiveness...and Tyler's. Could she trust the man she loved to bend his principles and extend the pardon that would bless them both? Views: 54
