Dinah Whitcomb seemingly has everything. A loving and successful husband, and a smart, precocious young son named Robbie. One day, their worlds are shattered when Dinah is attacked and Robbie is taken in a mall parking lot. Dinah, injured, attempts to follow, but is run over by the kidnapper's van, mangling her body nearly beyond repair. The kidnapper, a part-time Preacher named Chester Cash, calls himself Daddy Love, as he has abducted, tortured, and raped several young boys into being his lover and as well as his 'son'. He confines Robbie in a device called an Wooden Maiden, in essence a small coffin, and renamed him 'Gideon'. Daddy Love slowly brainwashes 'Gideon' into believing that he is Daddy Love's real son, and any time the boy resists or rebels it is met with punishment beyond his wildest nightmares. As Dinah recovers from her wounds, her world and her marriage struggle to exist every day. Though it seems hopeless, she keeps a flicker of hope alive that her son is still alive. As Robbie grows older, he becomes more aware of just how monstrous Daddy Love truly is. Though as a small boy he as terrified of what might happen if he disobeyed Daddy Love, Robbie begins to realize that the longer he stays in the home of this demon, the greater chance he'll end up like Daddy Love's other 'sons' who were never heard from again. Somewhere within this tortured young boy lies a spark of rebellion...and soon he sees just what lengths he must go to in order to have any chance at survival. Views: 39
"Believe me: the benefits of blindness have been greatly exaggerated. If I could see, I would never leave the house, I'd stay indoors reading the many books that surround me." --Jorge Luis BorgesDays before his death, Borges gave an intimate interview to his friend, the Argentine journalist Gloria Lopez Lecube. That interview is translated for the first time here, giving English-language readers a new insight into his life, loves, and thoughts about his work and country at the end of his life. Accompanying that interview are a selection of the fascinating interviews he gave throughout his career. Highlights include his celebrated conversations with Richard Burgin during Borges's time as a lecturer at Harvard University, in which he gives rich new insights into his own works and the literature of others, as well as discussing his now oft-overlooked political views. The pieces combine to give a new and revealing window on one of the most celebrated... Views: 39
Amazon.com Review When last encountered (2000's Dead and Gone ), career criminal Burke was on the rebound from a nearly successful assassination attempt, lying low and licking his wounds in Portland, Oregon. Severed from his connections in NYC, Burke survives on jobs--"violence for money" mostly--brokered by his live-in lover, Gem, an Asian beauty with a painful, larcenous past and a present to match. At hand is a task Burke has done before: the recovery of a runaway, a 16-year-old girl named Rosebud. But Burke, an assassin with scruples, knows when things aren't right. Rosebud's father, Kevin, has a '60s-era contempt of "The Man" that doesn't jibe with his obvious wealth. Mother Maureen limps through life on pharmaceutical crutches. Younger sister Daisy and best friend Jennifer know things but won't share. As his search spirals out from Portland's mean streets, Burke encounters a mysterious young woman, Ann O. Dyne, who offers to help for a price. Her raison d'être is pain management--securing and dispensing medications vital to the terminally ill but held beyond their reach by a largely uncaring cadre of doctors, lawyers, and politicians. Eventually, of course, this plot line connects with Rose's whereabouts. Andrew Vachss's MO here, as usual, is a mystery (Rosebud's disappearance) plus an actual cause célèbre (humane pain management). It's a risky formula that aims both to entertain and to enlighten. With its believably unbelievable characters, Vachss's spare noir, and steely pacing that counterpoints a bolt-upright climax, Burke's 13th outing is every bit as satisfying as the dozen that came before. Views: 39
Giles Armitage needed to get away from it all and a sailing holiday with friends was just the escape he needed. Everything was going well until they became stranded in thick fog. Luckily they were invited to stay at a small chateau nearby, until the weather cleared. But the atmosphere in the chateau was tense. Giles was brought face to face with the woman he once loved, and whom he was trying to forget--the hauntingly beautiful Miriam. Miriam's husband was clearly uneasy and she was terrified--convinced, as she confided in Giles, that someone was trying to kill her. Following a series of disturbing accidents, Giles began to think she could possibly be right. Views: 39
Изучение английского, путем чтения (средний уровень) -- ужастиков. Views: 39
Yet another tour de force from an American master of fiction In his fifth collection of short fiction, Andre Dubus exhibits his remarkable storytelling range. In "Deaths at Sea," two naval officers, one black and one white, must come to terms with a history and an institution steeped in racism. "After the Game" tells the story of a Hispanic shortstop on a major-league baseball team who suddenly and without explanation loses his mind. And in "Rose," a mother finally stands up to her husband's abuse of their children. The four novellas and two short stories that comprise The Last Worthless Evening traverse those facets of American life that are at the same time cruel and commonplace, and with spare, immediate prose, render them universal. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Andre Dubus including rare photos and never-before-seen documents from the author's estate. Views: 39
Abby Lovitt doesn't realize how unprepared she is when she takes her beloved horse, True Blue, to a clinic led by the most famous equestrian anyone knows. The biggest surprise, though, is that Sophia, the girl who never makes a mistake, suddenly makes so many that she stops riding. Who will ride her horse? Abby's dad seems to think it will be Abby. Pie in the Sky is the most expensive horse Abby has ever ridden. But he is proud and irritable, and he takes Abby's attention away from the continuing mystery that is True Blue. And then there's high school--Abby finds new friends, but also new challenges, and a larger world that sometimes seems strange and intimidating. She begins to wonder if there is another way to look at horses, people, and life itself. Accompanied by the beautiful imagery of 1960s Northern California, Abby's charming mix of innocence and wisdom guide us through Pulitzer Prize winner Jane Smiley's latest middle-grade horse novel. Views: 39
South Brooklyn. Not the Brooklyn of Spike Lee or Matty Rich, but acounterpoint: those left behind in the white flight. Mike is 19 and atloose ends: driving for Big Lou's Car Service and trying to decide ifhe should stay in college or drift into the omnipresent arena of localorganized crime. Mike's life is changed forever as he's forced toconfront the grim realities of wiseguy justice and his own culpabilityin its execution. Echoing such urban low-life classics as Price's The Wanderers and Selby's Last Exit, this novel offers an honest, unromantic look at Brooklyn's underclass. Tim McLoughlin was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, where he still resides. He is employed in the King's County Supreme Court. Critical praise for Heart of the Old Country: "Set in the depths of working-class Brooklyn, this zippy first novel reads like an inspired cross between Richard Price's Bloodbrothersand Ross Macdonald's The Chill-part coming-of-age story,part thriller. Streetwise 19-year-old protagonist Mike spends his daysdriving for a car service and his nights attending college part-time.While trying to figure out which endeavor is more futile, he winds upon the periphery of a murder that will forever alter his destiny. Addto the mix Mike's marriage-minded neighborhood girlfriend, hisborderline-wiseguy bookie dad, and a sexy and sophisticated coedtemptress, and you've got all the ingredients for what may be a wholenew genre: Call it mook noir. A-"-Tom Sinclair, Entertainment Weekly "Tim McLoughlin writes about South Brooklyn with a fidelity to people and place reminiscent of James T. Farrell's Studs Lonigan and George Orwell's Down and Out in Paris and London.Among the achievements of his swiftly paced narrative is a cast ofauthentic and frequently complex characters whose voices reflect dreamsand love as well as desperation to survive. No voice in this symphonyof a novel is more impressive than that of Mr. McLoughlin, a youngwriter with a rare gift for realism and empathy."-Sidney Offit, authorof Memoir of the Bookie's Son Views: 39
Amidst the myth and folklore of Tavistock in 1322, one tale above all others strikes fear into the hearts of the town's inhabitants - that of the murders on the Abbot's Way. One cold winter, many years ago, a young acolyte eager for distraction led a group of fellow novices in the theft of their abbot's wine store. Later, crippled with guilt and fear of discovery, Milbrosa was driven to commit still more crimes in an effort to disguise his sins. But his soul had been destroyed with his first sip of illicit wine, and, as legend has it, the devil himself appeared to mete out his punishment, leading the unwitting Milbrosa and his cohorts to their deaths on the treacherous Devon moors. Now, in the autumn of 1322, it looks as though history may be repeating itself. Abbot Robert has found his wine barrel empty, and a body has been discovered on the moors. Bailiff Simon Puttock, in Tavistock for the coining, is called upon to investigate, but the case seems only to get more complicated with time. It soon becomes apparent that it's not just wine that's gone missing from the abbey, and the body on the moor isn't the last. With the arrival of Sir Baldwin Furnshill, Keeper of the King's Peace, the townspeople hope the mystery will finally be solved - but do the terrors of the past provide the key to their present turmoil? Views: 39
'A heart-breaker . . . it has the kind of indefinably powerful impact of The Great Gatsby' Observer'The surprise bestseller ... read, loved and wept over by men and women of all ages' Guardian'A tale of young love and disenchantment, of missed opportunities and passion's elusive, flickering flame' Financial TimesHer dark eyes were lost in thought, absently staring into the distance, drawing on a last wisp of hope as she searched for something that she was almost certain she would never find.'The magical novel about a Turkish man who falls in love with an artist in 1920s Berlin ... recreates a vanished era and dramatises a doomed relationship with verve, depth and poignancy. The result is a miniature masterpiece' The National'Moving and memorable, full of yearning and melancholy' The Times'A tale of young... Views: 39
