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The Writing on the Wall
By Hilda Glynn-Ward, Patricia Roy. 1974
With tales of a gruesome murder, a typhoid epidemic, corrupt politicians, and a Japanese invasion, The Writing on the Wall…
was intended to shock its readers when it was published in 1921. Thinly disguised as a novel, it is a propaganda tract exhorting white British Columbians to greater vigilance to prevent greedy politicians from selling out to the Chinese and Japanese. It was also designed to convince eastern Canada of British Columbia's need for protections against an onslaught of the 'yellow peril.'This novel is not exceptional in its extreme racism; it reiterates almost every anti-oriental cliché circulating in British Columbia at the time of its publication. While modern readers will find the story horrifying and unbelievable, it is in fact based on real incidents. Many of the views expressed were only exaggerated versions of ideas held throughout the country about non-Anglo-Saxon immigrants. The Writing on the Wall is a vivid illustration of the fear and prejudice with which immigrants were regarded in the early twentieth century.Maleficium
By David Homel, Fred A. Reed, Martine Desjardins. 2009
Martine Desjardins delivers to readers of Maleficium the unexpurgated revelations of Vicar Jerome Savoie, a heretic priest in nineteenth century…
Montreal. Braving threats from the Catholic Church, Savoie dares to violate the sanctity of the confessional in this confession-within-a-confession, in which seven penitents, each afflicted with a debilitating malady or struck with a crippling deformity, relates his encounter with an enigmatic young woman whose lips bear a striking scar.As these men penetrate deep into the exotic Orient, each falls victim to his own secret vice. One treks through Ethiopia in search of wingless locusts. Another hunts for fly-whisks among the clove plantations of Zanzibar. Yet others bargain for saffron in a Srinagar bazaar, search for the rarest frankincense, and pursue the coveted hawksbill turtle in the Sea of Oman. Two more seek the formula for sabon Nablus in Palestine or haggle over Persian carpets in the royal gardens of Shiraz. The men's individual forms of punishment, revealed through the agency of the young woman, are wrought upon their bodies.Baroque in its complexity, Kafka-like in its inexorable mechanics, Maleficium by turns astonishes, amuses, and beguiles. Then author Martine Desjardins's Vicar Savoie-as in any confession worth its communion wafer-saves the best (or worst) for last.Maleficium won the Prix Jacques Brossard and was a finalist for the Governor General's Literary Award (French Fiction), the Prix des libraires du Québec, the Prix des cinq continents de la Francophonie, and the Prix France-Québec.Odd Girl Out
By Ann Bannon. 1957
Twilight Girl
By Della Martin. 2006
The swaggering butches and dolled-up femmes of this 1961 lesbian pulp novel experience the guilt, thrills, and wonder of forbidden…
love."She knew why they danced with such gay desperation."A budding butch in the Brylcreem era, Lorraine "Lon" Harris fantasizes about a South Pacific island full of women, where everyone will be free and accepting, and she'll never have to wear an eyelet blouse again. Spurned by her high school English teacher, Lon turns to a new friend, the brash, purple-haired Violet, who draws Lon into the lesbian underworld of suburban Los Angeles, to the sordid 28 Percent Club, a private bar where those with "contaminated passions" cling to each other. Here, among the swaggering butches and dolled-up femmes, Lon will discover herself. And here she will first lay eyes on brilliant, lovely Mavis, a black jazz pianist and the girlfriend of wealthy Sassy Gregg, whose heavy bracelets may as well be brass knuckles where Lon is concerned.Spring Fire
By Vin Packer. 1952
Her silky black hair. Her low-cut gown. Her sparkling sorority pin. It's autumn rush in the Tri Epsilon house, and…
the new pledge, Susan Mitchell-"Mitch" to her friends-trembles as the fastest girl on campus, the lovely Leda Taylor, crosses the room toward her for a dance. Will Leda corrupt Mitch? Or will the strong and silent Mitch draw the queen of Tri Ep into the forbidden world of Lesbian Love?Spring Fire was the first lesbian paperback novel and sold an amazing 1.5 million copies when it first appeared in 1952. It launched an entire genre of lesbian novels, as well as the writing career of Vin Packer, one of the pseudonyms of prolific author Marijane Meaker, whose acclaimed memoir, Highsmith: A Romance of the 1950s, told the story of her own forbidden love. Now available after forty years out of print, Spring Fire is both a vital part of lesbian history and a steamy page-turner.The Blacker the Ink
By John Jennings, Craig Fischer, Frances Gateward, Rebecca Wanzo, William Lafi Youmans, Kinohi Nishikawa, Blair Davis, Nancy Goldstein, Daniel F. Yezbick, Sally Mcwilliams, James J. Zeigler, Qiana Whitted, Reynaldo Anderson, Hershini Bhana Young, Robin Means Coleman, Patrick F. Walter, Consuela Francis, Andre Carrington. 2015
When many think of comic books the first thing that comes to mind are caped crusaders and spandex-wearing super-heroes. Perhaps,…
inevitably, these images are of white men (and more rarely, women). It was not until the 1970s that African American superheroes such as Luke Cage, Blade, and others emerged. But as this exciting new collection reveals, these superhero comics are only one small component in a wealth of representations of black characters within comic strips, comic books, and graphic novels over the past century. The Blacker the Ink is the first book to explore not only the diverse range of black characters in comics, but also the multitude of ways that black artists, writers, and publishers have made a mark on the industry. Organized thematically into "panels" in tribute to sequential art published in the funny pages of newspapers, the fifteen original essays take us on a journey that reaches from the African American newspaper comics of the 1930s to the Francophone graphic novels of the 2000s. Even as it demonstrates the wide spectrum of images of African Americans in comics and sequential art, the collection also identifies common character types and themes running through everything from the strip The Boondocks to the graphic novel Nat Turner. Though it does not shy away from examining the legacy of racial stereotypes in comics and racial biases in the industry, The Blacker the Ink also offers inspiring stories of trailblazing African American artists and writers. Whether you are a diehard comic book fan or a casual reader of the funny pages, these essays will give you a new appreciation for how black characters and creators have brought a vibrant splash of color to the world of comics.I Was There the Night He Died
By Ray Robertson. 2014
"Ray Robertson is an irrepressible voice, with brass balls, and a heart of gold. I Was There the Night He…
Died is a hilarious, moving, insightful, and timely piece of modern realism, delightfully void of literary pretension. Here, at last, is a novel that rocks and rolls."-Jonathan Evison, author of The Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving"So," she says. "Who died tonight?"Sam Samson, meet Samantha. Sam's a novelist: his dad has Alzheimer's, his mother died of stroke, his wife was killed seventeen months ago in a car crash. Samantha, eighteen, is a cutter. She lives across the street from Sam's parents' house. Marijuana and loneliness spark an unlikely friendship, which Sam finds hard to navigate, especially as his dad's condition worsens and the money for his care suddenly vanishes. Yet somehow, between a record player and a park bench, through late-night conversations about the deaths of Sam's musical heroes, and ultimately through each other, Sam and Samantha learn to endure the things they fear most.Starring a 40-something writer who stumbles through the small town he thought he'd left behind forever, and a marooned teenager who wishes she were anywhere else, I Was There The Night He Died is a saucy, swaggering look at loss, love, and the redeeming power of music in the twenty-first century.Praise for Ray Robertson,A Women's National Book Association Great Group Reads Author, 2013Shortlisted for the Hilary Weston Prize, 2011and the Trillium Prize, 2008 "Ray Robertson is the Jerry Lee Lewis of North American Letters."-Chuck Kinder, author of Honeymooners "Both playful and profound, laced with insight from music to history, politics to literature, high to low culture."-National Post "Robertson's art is as character-driven as Mordecai Richler's ... he wants us all to behave better and doesn't care who he angers along the way."-Globe and MailThe Whole
By John Reed. 2005
From John Reed, author of the controversial Orwell parody,Snowball's Chance,comes a subversive satire of modern culture, the complete lack thereof,…
and a lost generation that no one even tried to look for. In the middle of America's heartland, a young boy digs a small hole in the ground. . . which grows into a big hole in the ground. . . which then proceeds to drag the boy, his parents, his dog, and most of their house into a deep void. Then, as abruptly as the hole started growing, it stops. So begins the first in a series of events that takes the beautiful-if-not-brainy Thing on a quest to uncover the truth behind the mysterious Hole. Inspired by visions, signs, and an unlimited supply of pink cocktails served by an ever-lurking "Black Rabbit," Thing and her dogged production crew travel around America, encountering Satanists, an Extraterrestrial/Christian cult group, and a surprisingly helpful phone psychic. Their search for answers could very well decide the fate of the world as they know it. But the more Thing learns about the Hole, her shocking connection to it, and the mind-boggling destiny that awaits her, the more she realizes that human civilization isn't all it's cracked up to be -- and that it's just about time to start over.Women in the Shadows
By Ann Bannon. 2002
Designated the "Queen of Lesbian Pulp" for her landmark novels beginning in 1957, Ann Bannon's work defined lesbian fiction for…
the pre-Stonewall generation. Following the release of Cleis Press's new editions of Beebo Brinker and Odd Girl Out, Women in the Shadows picks up with Beebo's relationship with Laura waning, as both women become caught in the cultural tumult (gay bar raids, heavy drinking, gay rights advocacy) that anticipates by ten years the Stonewall Rebellion of 1969. New introduction explains the book's evolution, including the role Bannon's divorce played in shaping the lesbian protagonist's outrage.Bob Stevenson
By Richard Wiley. 2016
"A witty, roller-coaster ride of uncertain identity set against the gritty certainties of New York City. In compelling, unadorned prose,…
Richard Wiley gives us a bewitching and ultimately moving tale." -Caryl Phillips, author of A Distant Shore and The Lost ChildDr. Ruby Okada meets a charming man with a Scottish accent in the elevator of her psychiatric hospital. Unaware that he is an escaping patient, she falls under his spell, and her life and his are changed forever by the time they get to the street.Who is the mysterious man? Is he Archie B. Billingsly, suffering from dissociative identity disorder and subject to brilliant flights of fancy and bizarre, violent fits? Or is he the reincarnation of Robert Louis Stevenson, back to haunt New York as Long John Silver and Mr. Edward Hyde? Her career compromised, Ruby soon learns that her future and that of her unborn child depend on finding the key to his identity. With compelling psychological descriptions and terrifying, ineffable transformations, Bob Stevenson is an ingenious tale featuring a quirky cast of characters drawn together by mutual fascination, need, and finally, love.Richard Wiley is the author of eight novels including Soldiers in Hiding, winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, and Ahmed's Revenge, winner of the Maria Thomas Fiction Award. Professor emeritus at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, he divides his time between Los Angeles, California and Tacoma, Washington.Against the Wind
By Howard Scott, Madeleine Gagnon, Phyllis Aronoff. 2012
Is an artist born, or rather, created by experience? From the moment in childhood when he is forced to take…
drastic action to defend his adoptive mother from a violent assault - the only maternal figure that he has ever known - it is evident that the life of Joseph Sully-Jacques is to be no ordinary life, and one marked by sorrow and adversity.Unable to cope with or even recognize the residual effects of his trauma in adolescence, Joseph retreats into an increasingly abstract world, one in which he must confront what he calls his "visions." And when he hears of the death of his natural mother, this brings to the surface memories he had hoped were buried deep within him, and precipitates the form of various crises to come, particularly as he discovers and makes use of the artistic abilities revealed to his family during his psychiatric evaluation.After many more hardships, the young man does find meaning to the absurdities of life, ironically in the asylum, where he meets a virtuoso pianist whose condition prevents her from continuing to exercise her talents. They heal together through their mutual love, which will soon subsist upon nothing but memory and absence. During mournful years of raising his son alone, in his extensive adversaria, Joseph sets out to reconcile the contradictory themes in his life, including abandonment, madness, love, and death.In spare, lucid prose, and in a style reminiscent of André Gide, Madeleine Gagnon invites the reader to experience the creation and development of an artist "in his own words" - Joseph's gelid journal entries that are to become emphatic poetic laments - in a novel that chronicles the extreme destitution of Quebec in the years before World War Two and in abstract developing forms of artistic expression after years of uncertainty and loss.A Slight Case of Fatigue
By Stéphane Bourguignon. 2002
At forty-one, Eddy is in existential extremis. He once had an enviable life--a wife he adored, a young son, a…
cozy suburban house surrounded by carefully planted and sculpted gardens, the luxury to pursue his passion and become a professional horticulturalist. Now he's separated from his wife, estranged from his son, he's let his garden grow wild--like the rest of his life, it's totally out of control. When his son, Maxime, tired of being embarrassed by his father's dilapidated house, his garden gone to seed and his old beater of a car, decides to leave home and live with his cool, professional mother--who immediately demands twice the alimony--Eddy goes on a rampage, smashing his son's furniture and hurtling it and his possessions through windows he neglects to open first. Ending up in the hospital, the doctor diagnoses "a slight case of fatigue." As Eddy plunges deeper into despair, insomnia and self-destruction, frantically searching for a way to live an authentic life, punching out his boss and finally threatening his best friend with a gun, the narrative voice of the novel changes, and we begin to see Eddy, his parents, his childhood and his past loves through the eyes of his wife, friends and companions. Stéphane Bourguignon, the creator of the much-loved television series La vie, la vie, about a group of thirty-somethings in Montreal, has said that he wanted this book to look at the darker side of life. Written like a surrealist Camus on steroids, in multiple voices, with an uncanny eye and ear for graphic physicality and keen psychological insight, Bourguignon's examination of relationships between men and women, fathers and sons, past wounds and present possibilities is filled with a raucous warmth and humanity--but it is also intensely, darkly and almost unbearably humorous. Translated by Phyllis Aronoff & Howard ScottAnime Explosion!
By Patrick Drazen. 2002
An updated look at Japanese animation, and the manga that inspired them. New chapters on "Fullmetal Alchemist," manga/anime by CLAMP,…
and Satoshi Kon. It brings fans up to date on Studio Ghibli movies after the Academy Award-winning "Spirited Away," new titles like "Negima" and "Ouran High School Host Club," and breakthrough same-sex stories "Gravitation" and "Mother Mary is Watching."One of Us Is Sleeping
By Martin Aitken, Josefine Klougart. 2016
"Scandinavia now has its own Virginia Woolf. Few get as close to the human mind as Klougart"--Mari Nymoen Nilsen, VGThe…
English-language debut from one of Denmark's most exciting, celebrated young writers, One of Us Is Sleeping is a haunting novel about loss in all its forms.Working in the vein of Anne Carson, Josefine Klougart's novel is both true-to-life and incredibly poetic in its relating of a brief, intense love affair and the grief and disillusionment that follow its end. While she recounts the time with her lover, the narrator is also heading back home, where her mother is dying of cancer. This contrast between recollection and the belief that certain things will always be present in your life--your parents, your childhood home, your love--and the fact that life is a continual series of endings runs throughout the book, underpinning the striking imagery and magnificent prose.A powerful novel that earned Klougart numerous accolades and several award nominations--including the Readers Book Award--One of Us Is Sleeping marks the launch of a major new voice in world literature.Josefine Klougart has been hailed as one of Denmark's greatest contemporary writers. She is the first Danish author ever to have two of her first three books nominated for the Nordic Council Literature Prize. She's been compared to a range of authors, including Joan Didion, Anne Carson, and Virginia Woolf.Martin Aitken has translated dozens of books from the Danish, including works by Dorthe Nors, Jussi Adler-Olsen, Peter Høeg, and Kim Leine, among others.Beebo Brinker
By Ann Bannon. 1962
Ann Bannon was designated the "Queen of Lesbian Pulp" for authoring several landmark novels in the '50s. Unlike many writers…
of the period, however, Bannon broke through the shame and isolation typically portrayed in lesbian pulps, offering instead characters who embraced their sexuality. With Beebo Brinker, Bannon introduces a butch 17-year-old farm girl newly arrived in Beat-era Greenwich Village.Truth in Fiction: Rethinking Its Logic (Synthese Library #391)
By John Woods. 2018
This monograph examines truth in fiction by applying the techniques of a naturalized logic of human cognitive practices. The author…
structures his project around two focal questions. What would it take to write a book about truth in literary discourse with reasonable promise of getting it right? What would it take to write a book about truth in fiction as true to the facts of lived literary experience as objectivity allows?It is argued that the most semantically distinctive feature of the sentences of fiction is that they areunambiguously true and false together. It is true that Sherlock Holmes lived at 221B Baker Street and also concurrently false that he did. A second distinctive feature of fiction is that the reader at large knows of this inconsistency and isn’t in the least cognitively molested by it. Why, it is asked, would this be so? What would explain it?Two answers are developed. According to the no-contradiction thesis, the semantically tangled sentences of fiction are indeed logically inconsistent but not logically contradictory. According to the no-bother thesis, if the inconsistencies of fiction were contradictory, a properly contrived logic for the rational management of inconsistency would explain why readers at large are not thrown off cognitive stride by their embrace of those contradictions. As developed here, the account of fiction suggests the presence of an underlying three - or four-valued dialethic logic. The author shows this to be a mistaken impression. There are only two truth-values in his logic of fiction.The naturalized logic of Truth in Fiction jettisons some of the standard assumptions and analytical tools of contemporary philosophy, chiefly because the neurotypical linguistic and cognitive behaviour of humanity at large is at variance with them. Using the resources of a causal response epistemology in tandem with the naturalized logic, the theory produced here is data-driven, empirically sensitive, and open to a circumspect collaboration with the empirical sciences of language and cognition.Chicken Soup for the Soul at Work: Stories of Courage, Compassion and Creativity in the Workplace
By Jack Canfield, Mark Hansen, Tim Clauss, Maida Rogerson, Martin Rutte. 2012
Work is an important part of living, whether you wait on customers, build a business, or cook for your family.…
As such, we all have important stories to tell about our work. From this rich treasure chest of experiences, Canfield, Hansen, and company have gathered a special collection of inspiring tales that share the daily courage, compassion, and creativity that take place in workplaces everywhere. Chicken Soup for the Soul at Work will nourish your spirit with stories of courageous leaders and will foster your creativity with examples of inspiring breakthroughs. It will also teach you how to enrich yourself and your coworkers through heartfelt acknowledgment. This powerful book gives you new options, new ways to succeed, and, above all, a new love and appreciation for yourself, your job, and those around you. Share it with your mentor, coworkers, or staff, and enjoy renewed joy and pleasure in your chosen vocation. Special stories by Dilbert's Scott Adams, Beverly Sills, Dave Thomas, and many more make this collection complete.Chicken Soup for the Soul at Work: Stories of Courage, Compassion and Creativity in the Workplace
By Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, Maida Rogerson, Martin Rutte, Tim Clauss. 2012
Work is an important part of living, whether you wait on customers, build a business, or cook for your family.…
As such, we all have important stories to tell about our work. From this rich treasure chest of experiences, Canfield, Hansen, and company have gathered a special collection of inspiring tales that share the daily courage, compassion, and creativity that take place in workplaces everywhere. Chicken Soup for the Soul at Work will nourish your spirit with stories of courageous leaders and will foster your creativity with examples of inspiring breakthroughs. It will also teach you how to enrich yourself and your coworkers through heartfelt acknowledgment. This powerful book gives you new options, new ways to succeed, and, above all, a new love and appreciation for yourself, your job, and those around you. Share it with your mentor, coworkers, or staff, and enjoy renewed joy and pleasure in your chosen vocation. Special stories by Dilbert's Scott Adams, Beverly Sills, Dave Thomas, and many more make this collection complete.Miss Take
By Will Browning, Réjean Ducharme. 2011
Sixteen-year-old Miles has run away from home, inviting his childhood companion, the fourteen-year-old Inuit orphan Chateaugué, to join him in…
a rented flat opposite Notre-Dame-de-Bonsecours in Montreal. There they construct a chaste life for themselves, living as brother and sister. They spend their days riding bicycles wildly through the streets of the city, dodging the automobiles that symbolize for them the adult world they despise, a world that has dominated the landscape with its roadmaps of social discourse. They spend hours at the library, laughing with disdain at how the classics have become venerated, how their authors' words and turns of phrase have become confused with the things and actions they signify. Enthralled by the works of the "mad" poet Nelligan, Miles begins a journal, determined to free language from the constraints of convention, but finds he cannot write anything without immediately conjuring up its opposite.To escape the boredom that history seems to have decreed shall be re-enacted endlessly by all grown-ups, Miles and Chateaugué enter into a suicide pact to preserve their childhood freedom and purity from the debasement of the adult roles pre-ordained for them.Destitute after spending what little money they have, Miles goes to a bar in search of a drink, where he is seduced by an older woman, and suddenly finds himself both attracted and repelled by the pleasures and debasements of the flesh. Having stepped out of their world of childhood innocence, can he return to Chateaugué and consummate their vows, or is this brush with experience irrevocable?Written in a style that echoes the work of Arthur Rimbaud and William S. Burroughs, Ducharme's vision is darkly prophetic of a world that has lost its innocence, and on which "our lady of good help" now only gazes with an inscrutable Mona Lisa smile.Miss Take
By Will Browning, R jean Ducharme. 2011
Sixteen-year-old Miles has run away from home, inviting his childhood companion, the fourteen-year-old Inuit orphan Chateaugué, to join him in…
a rented flat opposite Notre-Dame-de-Bonsecours in Montreal. There they construct a chaste life for themselves, living as brother and sister. They spend their days riding bicycles wildly through the streets of the city, dodging the automobiles that symbolize for them the adult world they despise, a world that has dominated the landscape with its roadmaps of social discourse. They spend hours at the library, laughing with disdain at how the classics have become venerated, how their authors' words and turns of phrase have become confused with the things and actions they signify. Enthralled by the works of the "mad" poet Nelligan, Miles begins a journal, determined to free language from the constraints of convention, but finds he cannot write anything without immediately conjuring up its opposite.To escape the boredom that history seems to have decreed shall be re-enacted endlessly by all grown-ups, Miles and Chateaugué enter into a suicide pact to preserve their childhood freedom and purity from the debasement of the adult roles pre-ordained for them.Destitute after spending what little money they have, Miles goes to a bar in search of a drink, where he is seduced by an older woman, and suddenly finds himself both attracted and repelled by the pleasures and debasements of the flesh. Having stepped out of their world of childhood innocence, can he return to Chateaugué and consummate their vows, or is this brush with experience irrevocable?Written in a style that echoes the work of Arthur Rimbaud and William S. Burroughs, Ducharme's vision is darkly prophetic of a world that has lost its innocence, and on which "our lady of good help" now only gazes with an inscrutable Mona Lisa smile.