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By Andreas Souvaliotis. 2019
Updated and expanded: A new edition of the inspiring memoir by one of Canada's most unusual, successful and socially conscious…
businesspeople."I am different. I have always been different. I grew up scared of being found out, scared of my natural inability to fit in, to conform, to look and sound and dress and behave 'normal.' I was always drawn to the different ones and I observed them with fascination--but the thought of being even a little bit like them mortified me. I was desperate to fit in. . . ." --From MisfitAndreas Souvaliotis was raised at a time when being on the autism spectrum wasn't easily diagnosed or even discussed. Minds like his were simply considered odd. He also knew from an early age he was gay, and it terrified him as he was growing up with openly homophobic parents in one of Europe's least tolerant societies.Andreas's differences made him an outsider, right through to his mid-forties. And then suddenly, everything changed. Misfit is the extraordinary memoir of a man who realized there was strength in his strangeness, that it could be used as a force for good. "It all happened in a flash. On a beautiful spring morning in 2007, sitting in my backyard and licking my wounds from a spectacular career derailment, I came up with a big idea--and I found myself contemplating the most daring and unconventional pursuit of my life." The weird kid from Greece was on his way to making his world, and everyone's world, a better place.Andreas Souvaliotis's inspiring story shows us that everyone has what it takes to trigger positive change, and that none of us should see our differences and quirks as handicaps.• The author is donating all of his proceeds from this book to 6 Degrees, a global charitable initiative that promotes inclusion, diversity, belonging and citizenhip. 6degreesto.comBy Jonathan Safran Foer, Jonathan Saffran Foer. 2005
Esta historia cuenta el viaje de un joven norteamericano a Ucrania en busca de los origenes de su familia, una…
inquietante y divertida odisea a traves de los claroscuros de la memoria en la que poco a poco se iran iluminando los desertados escenarios de un pasado turbador: la Segunda Guerra Mundial, el holocausto o la fundacion, en el siglo XVIII, de Trachimbrod, el pueblo del que es originaria la familia del protagonistaBy Harry Bernstein. 2008
In a small English town on the eve of WWI, Harry's family struggles to make ends meet. His father spends…
his low wages on drinking on gambling. His mother, devoted to her children survives on her dreams. His older sister does the unthinkable; she falls in love with a Christian. They are separated by an "invisible wall". When Harry discovers the affair, he must choose what he knows to be true in his heartBy Taylor Caldwell. 1975
Novel based upon the life of Genghis Khan, the thirteenth-century Mongol chieftain who led his swarm of shaggy barbarians over…
Asia, the Near East, and Hungary. The story begins with his birth as Temujin, the son of a petty chief in the Gobi desert, and ends with his first great victoryDeux sœurs nées à huit ans d'écart dans un petit village de la Gaspésie se retrouvent à Montréal au tournant…
des années 1970 : l'aînée, pionnière du journalisme moderne et future conseillère politique du premier ministre René Lévesque, vit les années d'or d'une brillante carrière, tandis que la cadette met résolument le pied dans l'autonomie. Ni l'une ni l'autre ne se doute qu'au fil de leur engagement respectif dans la société en marche, leurs destins seront soudés par la maladie mentale durant les quarante prochaines annéesBy Lee Riordan. 1997
In 1923, one of the greatest natural disasters ever recorded struck one of the most densely populated areas in the…
world. In Jishin, author Lee Riordan recreates this calamity, the Great Kanto Earthquake, providing both stirring adventure and touching romance.This book vividly describes the shaking and shuddering of the quake itself, during which thousands died, as much of the cities of Tokyo and Yokohama collapsed around their inhabitants. In the ensuing fires, many more perished as insatiable flames tore through the cities, destroying property and life. This gripping historical novel retells the story of the terrible quake that took over 140,000 lives.Jishin is also the story of Tatiana, the Russian countess, and Hugh, the American professor, who discover their love for one another against the backdrop of this destruction. The author built his tale on the recollections of Tatiana and Hugh, who were his parents, providing the book with an authenticity that gives it unusual poignancy and realism.By Gregor Von Rezzori, H. F. Broch De Rothermann. 1989
Gregor von Rezzori was born in Czernowitz, a onetime provincial capital of the Austro-Hungarian Empire that was later to be…
absorbed successively into Romania, the USSR, and the Ukraine--a town that was everywhere and nowhere, with a population of astonishing diversity. Growing up after World War I and the collapse of the empire, Rezzori lived in a twilit world suspended between the formalities of the old nineteenth-century order which had shaped his aristocratic parents and the innovations, uncertainties, and raw terror of the new century. The haunted atmosphere of this dying world is beautifully rendered in the pages of The Snows of Yesteryear.The book is a series of portraits--amused, fond, sometimes appalling--of Rezzori's family: his hysterical and histrionic mother, disappointed by marriage, destructively obsessed with her children's health and breeding; his father, a flinty reactionary, whose only real love was hunting; his haughty older sister, fated to die before thirty; his earthy nursemaid, who introduced Rezzori to the power of storytelling and the inevitability of death; and a beloved governess, Bunchy. Telling their stories, Rezzori tells his own, holding his early life to the light like a crystal until it shines for us with a prismatic brilliance.By Lee Riordan. 1997
In 1923, one of the greatest natural disasters ever recorded struck one of the most densely populated areas in the…
world. In Jishin, author Lee Riordan recreates this calamity, the Great Kanto Earthquake, providing both stirring adventure and touching romance.This book vividly describes the shaking and shuddering of the quake itself, during which thousands died, as much of the cities of Tokyo and Yokohama collapsed around their inhabitants. In the ensuing fires, many more perished as insatiable flames tore through the cities, destroying property and life. This gripping historical novel retells the story of the terrible quake that took over 140,000 lives.Jishin is also the story of Tatiana, the Russian countess, and Hugh, the American professor, who discover their love for one another against the backdrop of this destruction. The author built his tale on the recollections of Tatiana and Hugh, who were his parents, providing the book with an authenticity that gives it unusual poignancy and realism.By James Womack, Sergio Del Molino. 2013
Winner of the Premio Ojo Crítico and Premio Tigre Juan, The Violet Hour is the celebration of a life cut…
short. A deeply moving memoir that shows us the inner life of a man confronted with his own limitations.Children who lose their parents are orphans, and those who have to close their spouse's dead eyes are widows and widowers. But we, the parents who sign the documents authorizing our children's funerals, we have no name, no civil status. We remain parents forever.Sergio del Molino is a Spanish writer and journalist who lives in Zaragoza. He has worked for almost ten years as a reporter in the Heraldo de Aragón, where he writes a Sunday column.By Lara Vergnaud, Zahia Rahmani. 2016
This moving tale of imprisonment and escape, persecution and loss, is narrated by the daughter of an alleged Harki, an…
Algerian soldier who fought for the French during the Algerian War for Independence. It was the fate of such men to be twice exiled, first in their homeland after the war, and later in France, where fleeing Harki families sought refuge but instead faced contempt, discrimination, and exclusion. Zahia Rahmani blends reality and imagination in her writing, offering a fictionalized version of her own family's struggle. Lara Vergnaud's beautiful translation from the French perfectly captures the voices and emotions of Rahmani's childhood in a foreign land. While the author delves deeply into the past, she also indicts present-day France and Algeria. From the unique perspective of the daughter of an accused Harki, she examines France's complex and controversial history with its former colony and offers new insight into the French civil riots of 2005. She makes a stirring plea for understanding between generations and cultures, and especially for an end to the destructive practice of condemning children for their fathers' actions and beliefs.By Douglas Lochhead, John Preston Buschlen. 1973
The story herein told is true to life; true, the greater part of it, to my own life. Also, I…
am convinced that my experience in A Canadian Bank was but mildly exciting as compared with that of many others. My object in publishing "Evan Nelson's" history is to enlighten the public concerning life behind the wicket and thus pave the way for the legitimate organization of bankclerks into a fraternal association, for their financial and social (including moral) betterment. Bank officials, I trust, will see to it that my misrepresentations are exposed. To mothers of bankclerks who attach overmuch importance to the gentility of their Boy's avocation; to fathers who think that because the bank is rich its employees must necessarily become so in time; to friends who criticize the bankclerks of their acquaintance for not settling down--this story is addressed. To the men of our banks who are dissatisfied with the business they have chosen, or someone else has chosen for them; to Old Country clerks who come out to Canada under the impression that Five Dollars is as good as One Pound; to bank employees in the United States, and to office men everywhere--I am telling my tale. Finally, I appeal to "the girls we have known." Be sure you study the subject thoroughly before accusing that inscrutable, proud and procrastinating clerk of yours of inconstancy. (From the Prologue)By Li-Young Lee. 2013
"It has true spiritual importance for contemporary American literature."-Edward HirschUpon its initial publication, acclaimed poet Li-Young Lee's memoir The Winged…
Seed: A Remembrance (1995), received an American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation. In lyrical prose, Lee's extraordinary story begins in the 1950s when his parents fled China's political turmoil for Indonesia. Along with many other Chinese members of the population, his family was persecuted under President Sukarno. Falsely accused and charged for crimes against the state, his father spent a year and a half in jail as a political prisoner, half of that time in a leper colony. While his entire family was being transported to a prison colony, they escaped and fled to Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, and back to Hong Kong where his father rose to prominence as an evangelical preacher. Eventually, the family sought asylum in the United States in 1962. When the author was six, they emigrated to a small town in western Pennsylvania where his father became a Presbyterian minister. This reissued edition contains a new foreword by the author and never-before-seen photos of the family from different stages of their journey.Li-Young Lee is the author of four critically acclaimed books of poetry that have garnered such awards as the Delmore Schwartz Memorial Award from New York University; the 1990 Lamont Poetry Selection; the Writer's Award from the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation; and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, The Lannan Foundation, and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.By Michael Loewe. 2011
Much is known of life during the Han Empire, but the historical evidence remains fragmentary, and nowhere do we find…
a continuous account of the life of any one individual.In this engaging volume, Michael Loewe mines the written and material records to depict the imagined life of an ordinary person, Bing Wu, from the hardships of his earliest years on a rural farm to his retirement from a respected position in government service. Underlying the tale of Bing is a richly detailed portrait of life during the Han--the arduous tasks of the conscript laborer; military service on the defense lines of the north; the travels of a merchant; the grueling conditions in an iron foundry; the construction of tombs; preparations for entering the civil service; the duties of a junior clerk and the governing of a commandery. Along the way, we are introduced to the operation of a crossbow; methods of telling time; the practice of writing; the rituals of divination; the ceremony of a state occasion, laws and the harsh consequences of breaking them; the workings of the central government and much more.Included are a concise introduction, explanatory endnotes to each chapter, a selection of illustrations, a map of the Han Empire, notes for further reading and an essay by Loewe entitled, "A Brief History of the Han Empire."By Alan M. Dershowitz. 2010
"No one knows more about Israel's existential dilemma than Alan Dershowitz-or writes about it better. From its explosive beginning to…
its startling climax, THE TRIALS OF ZION excites and intrigues, even as it depicts the unique dangers of a lethal part of the world. This is a terrific novel. " -Richard North Patterson "For a legalist, mired for years in towers of ivory not even hewn from the teeth of endangered elephants but constructed, indeed, and solely, of the casuistic and notional, Mr. Dershowitz writes a real good rip-snorter. " -David Mamet "A thought-provoking thriller set in two of the world's most gripping arenas of conflict, the Middle East and the courtroom. " -Steven Pinker, author ofThe Stuff of Thought,and Rebecca Newberger Goldstein, author of36 Arguments for the Existence of God: A Work of Fiction "As in all his essays, in his novel also, Alan Dershowitz demonstrates his great love for Israel as well as his inspired passion for Jewish memory, justice, and storytelling. " -Elie Wiesel A shocking act of terror brings the Middle East to the point of explosion. As the resulting political conflict threatens to erupt, a young Jewish-American lawyer joins the defense team of an arrested but possibly innocent Palestinian. Soon the lawyer's father, a famed criminal attorney, must win the Palestinian's case or risk losing his daughter forever. To do so, he must take into account the tormented history of the Holy Land from every possible angle. THE TRIALS OF ZION combines the tension of the greatest courtroom dramas with the action of a fast-moving thriller, all set against the colorful backdrop of one of the most complex cultural settings in the world. Filled with memorable characters, this novel offers readers not only compelling suspense, but a panoramic view of the history of a beloved and bitterly contested land, and a sharply controversial perspective on the sources of--and the possible solutions to--the world's longest and most crucial international crisis.By Intizar Husain, Asif Farrukhi, Frances W. Pritchett. 1979
An NYRB Classics OriginalBasti is a beautifully written reckoning with the tragic history of Pakistan. Basti means settlement, a common…
place, and Intizar Husain's extraordinary novel begins with a mythic, even mystic, vision of harmony between old and young, man and woman, Muslim and Hindu. Then Zakir, the hero, wakes to the modern world. Crowds gather. Slogans echo. Cities burn. Whether hunkered down with family or furtively meeting to exchange news with friends in cafés, Zakir is alone in a country lost to the politics of loneliness.history. The new country of Pakistan is born, separating him once and for all from the woman he loves, and in a jagged and jarring sequence of scenes we witness a nation and a psyche torn into existence only to be torn apart again and again by political, religious, economic, linguistic, personal, and sexual conflicts--in effect, a world of loneliness. Zakir, whose name means "remember," serves as the historian of this troubled place, while the ties he maintains across the years with old friends--friends who run into one another in cafés and on corners and the odd other places where history takes a time-out--suggest that the possibility of reconciliation is not simply a dream. The characters wait for a sign that minds and hearts may still meet. In the meantime, the dazzling artistry of Basti itself gives us reason to hope against hope.By Howard Goldblatt, Bi Feiyu, Sylvia Li-chun Lin. 2007
The debut novel of one of China's rising young literary talents--a gem of a book that takes a piercing look…
into the world of Chinese opera and its female stars In a fit of diva jealousy, Xiao Yanqiu, star of The Moon Opera, disfigures her understudy with boiling water. Spurned by the troupe, she turns to teaching. Twenty years later, a rich cigarette-factory boss offers to underwrite a restaging of the cursed opera, but only on the condition that Xiao Yanqiu return to the role of Chang'e. So she does, this time believing she has fully become the immortal moon goddess. Set against the drama, intrigue, jealousy, retribution, and redemption of backstage Peking opera, The Moon Opera is a stunning portrait of women in a world that simultaneously reveres and restricts them. Bi Feiyu, one of China's young literary stars, re-creates all the temptations and triumphs of the stage the world over in this gem of a novel.By Howard Goldblatt, Bi Feiyu, Sylvia Li. 2007
The debut novel of one of China's rising young literary talents--a gem of a book that takes a piercing look…
into the world of Chinese opera and its female stars In a fit of diva jealousy, Xiao Yanqiu, star of The Moon Opera, disfigures her understudy with boiling water. Spurned by the troupe, she turns to teaching. Twenty years later, a rich cigarette-factory boss offers to underwrite a restaging of the cursed opera, but only on the condition that Xiao Yanqiu return to the role of Chang'e. So she does, this time believing she has fully become the immortal moon goddess. Set against the drama, intrigue, jealousy, retribution, and redemption of backstage Peking opera, The Moon Opera is a stunning portrait of women in a world that simultaneously reveres and restricts them. Bi Feiyu, one of China's young literary stars, re-creates all the temptations and triumphs of the stage the world over in this gem of a novel.By James Womack, Sergio Molino. 2013
Winner of the Premio Ojo Crítico and Premio Tigre Juan, The Violet Hour is the celebration of a life cut…
short. A deeply moving memoir that shows us the inner life of a man confronted with his own limitations.Children who lose their parents are orphans, and those who have to close their spouse's dead eyes are widows and widowers. But we, the parents who sign the documents authorizing our children's funerals, we have no name, no civil status. We remain parents forever.Sergio del Molino is a Spanish writer and journalist who lives in Zaragoza. He has worked for almost ten years as a reporter in the Heraldo de Aragón, where he writes a Sunday column.By Lara Vergnaud, Zahia Rahmani. 2016
This moving tale of imprisonment and escape, persecution and loss, is narrated by the daughter of an alleged Harki, an…
Algerian soldier who fought for the French during the Algerian War for Independence. It was the fate of such men to be twice exiled, first in their homeland after the war, and later in France, where fleeing Harki families sought refuge but instead faced contempt, discrimination, and exclusion. Zahia Rahmani blends reality and imagination in her writing, offering a fictionalized version of her own family's struggle. Lara Vergnaud's beautiful translation from the French perfectly captures the voices and emotions of Rahmani's childhood in a foreign land. While the author delves deeply into the past, she also indicts present-day France and Algeria. From the unique perspective of the daughter of an accused Harki, she examines France's complex and controversial history with its former colony and offers new insight into the French civil riots of 2005. She makes a stirring plea for understanding between generations and cultures, and especially for an end to the destructive practice of condemning children for their fathers' actions and beliefs.By Sergey Gandlevsky. 2014
Sergey Gandlevsky is widely recognized as one of the leading living Russian poets and prose writers. His autobiographical novella Trepanation…
of the Skull is a portrait of the artist as a young late-Soviet man. At the center of the narrative are Gandlevsky's brain tumor, surgery, and recovery in the early 1990s. The story radiates out, relaying the poet's personal history through 1994, including his unique perspective on the 1991 coup by Communist hardliners resisted by Boris Yeltsin. Gandlevsky tells wonderfully strange but true episodes from the bohemian life he and his literary companions led. He also frankly describes his epic alcoholism and his ambivalent adjustment to marriage and fatherhood. Aside from its documentary interest, the book's appeal derives from its self-critical and shockingly honest narrator, who expresses himself in the densely stylized version of Moscow slang that was characteristic of the nonconformist intelligentsia of the 1970s and 1980s. Gandlevsky is a true artist of language who incorporates into his style the cadences of Pushkin and Tiutchev, the folk wisdom of proverbs, and slang in all its varieties. Susanne Fusso's excellent translation marks the first volume in English of Sergey Gandlevsky's prose, and it will interest scholars, students, and general readers of Russian literature and culture of the late Soviet and post-Soviet periods.