fiction; prose, Young Readers Views: 70
Review“Grim, violent and paradoxically elegant.” (Kirkus Reviews )“Glen Duncan is one of the best English-language writers working today—smart and musical, funny and serious at once. A day and a night and a day is a good estimation of how long it will take you to gulp down this wonderful novel.” (Darin Strauss, bestselling author of Chang & Eng and More Than it Hurts You )“Gripping…the darkest and most convincing account of the idiocies, insights and horrors of the “war on terror” that I’ve yet read.” (Salon.com )“A gripping, entertaining read.” (Orlando Sentinel )“Imagery is a tool of seduction for Duncan, who is one of England’s best-kept literary secrets. And he wields it brilliantly . . . A Day and a Night and a Day is a triumph.” (Richmond Times-Dispatch )“Duncan’s polished, merciless, and frequently hilarious prose supplies a trove of pleasures all its own.” (Publishers Weekly )“[Glen Duncan’s] paragraphs are nothing less than accomplishments. A DAY AND A NIGHT AND A DAY....delivers an astonishingly heady and warm and enthralling read. This is the good stuff.” (Charles Bock, bestselling author of BEAUTIFUL CHILDREN )“Thrilling, a probe deep into the heart of our age . . . bracing and original.” (International Herald Tribune )“A stunning new novel…I defy most readers to put it down.” (Cleveland Plain Dealer )“This stunning novel contains equal doses of cruelty and beauty, rendered with language so precise that it reaches your nerves with both pain and delight. There are no lukewarm emotions in this novel, only the intensity of people perpetually on the verge (Dalia Sofer, bestselling author of The Septembers of Shiraz )“Duncan can be clairvoyant about how people live now. . . . A Day and a Night and a Day . . . leave[s] you with the sense of having been brushed by something uncanny, so close does Duncan get to saying the unsayable. Bracing and original.” (New York Times Book Review )“A meticulously artful book.” (New York Magazine ) About the AuthorGlen Duncan is the critically acclaimed author of six previous novels, including Death of an Ordinary Man; I, Lucifer; and, most recently, The Bloodstone Papers. He lives in London. Views: 70
She couldn't bear the unexpected truth...Sara gladly accepted the offer of acting as companion to her youthful Aunt Harriet. Her father had recently died, and she welcomed the solace the English countryside offered.But life in Harriet's household proved far from peaceful. Most disturbing to Sara was Jude, a blunt and darkly seductive man. Why had Harriet hired him? And what did he do?Then understanding dawned on her: Jude was her aunt's lover. Yet she couldn't deny the deep attraction she herself felt for him - an attraction he seemed to reciprocate! Views: 70
The magnum opus by Akutagawa Prize-winner Fuminori Nakamura, Cult X is a story that dives into the psychology of fringe religion, obsession, and social disaffection. When Toru Narazaki's girlfriend, Ryoko, disappears, he tries to track her down, despite the warnings of a private detective he's hired to find her. Ryoko's past is shrouded in mystery, but the one concrete clue to her whereabouts is a previous address where she lived: in a compound in the heart of Tokyo, with a group that seems to be a cult led by a charismatic guru with a revisionist Buddhist scheme of life, death, and society. Narazaki plunges into the secretive world of the cult, ready to expose himself to any of the guru's brainwashing tactics if it means he can learn the truth about Ryoko. But the cult isn't what he expected, and he has no idea of the bubbling violence beneath its surface.Inspired by the 1995 sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway, Cult X is an exploration of what... Views: 70
A chance meeting between a middle-aged woman, a widower, and a semi-orphaned child in the city of Zurich, Switzerland, brings together three people who grapple with a past of loss and betrayal. Six-year-old Karla, whose mother died in a car crash, has a hard time accepting the loss. Anna, her aunt and guardian, struggles with her former husband's deception and her shattered confidence in men, and Jonas, artist and teacher, mourns the death of his wife. While trying to help Karla, a talented but troubled child, Anna and Jonas develop feelings for each other that go beyond friendship. The budding romance, however, hits a snag when Anna discovers a sinister secret in Jonas's past. While the two adults have come to an impasse, young Karla takes matters into her own hands. Together with a friend, she develops a plan to bring the two uncooperative adults back together. The plan, however, creates havoc and as it begins to unravel, Karla is forced to learn some difficult lessons. An Uncommon Family is a story about loss, lies, and betrayal but also about the healing power of love and forgiveness. It takes place in Switzerland, New York City, and Guadalajara, Mexico.About the AuthorBorn and raised in Switzerland, Christa Polkinhorn has always had the desire to explore the world outside of her beautiful but tiny country. As a young woman, she traveled through Europe, came to the United States on an exchange program, and ended up staying. Her travels led her to China and Japan as well as South America. She studied literature and linguistics in Zurich and California. Now, she lives and works as writer and translator in southern California and divides her time between the United States and her native Switzerland. The tension and excitement this “double life” creates informs her literary work. Most of her novels take place in several countries. Aside from writing and traveling, Christa is an avid reader and a lover of the arts and dark chocolate. Christa has published three novels, AN UNCOMMON FAMILY (Family Portrait, Book 1), LOVE OF A STONEMASON (Family Portrait, Book 2), EMILIA, (Family Potrait, Book 3) as well as a collection of poems, PATH OF FIRE. AN UNCOMMON FAMILY is also available in German under the title EINE UNGEWÖHNLICHE FAMILIE. Views: 70
The problem: Phoebe was poor and unhappy with her lot.The solution: Marry a rich man and she would be happy.It should be simple, except that her rich suitor, Ezekiel Hoppings, was ugly and her poor suitor, Charles Black, was handsome. But the more she got to know them both, the more Phoebe realized that some solutions were not as simple as they first appear. Views: 70
David Kepesh wakes up one morning in the hospital, mysteriously altered. Through an endocrinopathic catastrophe of unprecedented proportions, he has been transformed into a 155-pound human female breast. Railing at the incomprehensible, he uses his intelligence to deny and resist the thing he has become. Ultimately, he must accept his fate. Philip Roths The Breast is a funny, fantastical story and a bizarre yet daring exploration of sex and subjectivity. Views: 70
