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Cracking India: A Novel
By Bapsi Sidhwa. 1991
The 1947 Partition of India is the backdrop for this powerful novel, narrated by a precocious child who describes the…
brutal transition with chilling veracity. Young Lenny Sethi is kept out of school because she suffers from polio. She spends her days with Ayah, her beautiful nanny, visiting with the large group of admirers that Ayah draws. It is in the company of these working class characters that Lenny learns about religious differences, religious intolerance, and the blossoming genocidal strife on the eve of Partition. As she matures, Lenny begins to identify the differences between the Hindus, Moslems, and Sikhs engaging in political arguments all around her. Lenny enjoys a happy, privileged life in Lahore, but the kidnapping of her beloved Ayah signals a dramatic change. Soon Lenny's world erupts in religious, ethnic, and racial violence. By turns hilarious and heartbreaking, the domestic drama serves as a microcosm for a profound political upheaval.The Hungered One: Short Stories (AkashiClassics: Renegade Reprint Series)
By Ed Bullins. 2012
"A richness of language and observation pervades this collection of short stories by a black writer about real black people."--The…
New York Times Book ReviewThese early writings from award-winning playwright Ed Bullins explore loneliness and despair in beautifully crafted stories.Ed Bullins has written numerous plays and fiction, including In the Wine Time, Goin' a Buffalo, Clara's Ole Man, and The Taking of Miss Janie, which received the New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best American Play of the 1974-1975 season. His book of short fiction, The Hungered One: Early Writings, was originally published in 1971.Privilege
By Guinevere Glasfurd. 2022
18th century France - a world of fountains and gilded porcelain, literary salons and spies... where the right to live…
and think freely could cost you your life....I thought of the books we carried and the hands that would one day hold them. The pages read, turned and discussed. The book returned to the shelf, taken down to be read again. The book become thought and the thought become the person and the person gone out into the world. Let Gilbert try and put a stop to that...Privilege is set in the 18th century France of an Enlightenment at odds with the absolute power of the King determined to suppress opposition on pain of death.Delphine Vimond flees to Paris after being cast out from her home in Rouen when her father is disgraced. Into her life tumbles Chancery Smith, apprentice printer from London, sent to discover the mysterious author of potentially seditious papers marked only D.In a battle of wits with the French censor, Henri Gilbert, Delphine and Chancery set off in a frantic search for D's author. But who is he - and does he even exist?A novel in defence of reason, humanism and hope.(P) 2022 Hodder & Stoughton LimitedWhat you never knew about fingers, forks & chopsticks (Around-the-house history)
By Patricia Lauber, John Manders. 1999
Describes the development of eating customs and table manners from the Stone Age through modern days. Explains how knives, spoons,…
chopsticks, and eventually forks came into use and what was considered polite in different centuries and countries. For grades 2-4. 1999The polished hoe: a novel
By Austin Clarke. 2003
Award-winning novel set on a small Caribbean island, mid-twentieth century. Mary-Mathilda, servant and mistress of the village's plantation owner, summons…
detective Percy Stuart to confess to murder. Her nightlong statement, complicated by Percy's romantic feelings, reveals a sordid history. Explicit descriptions of sex, strong language, and some violence. 2003Privilege
By Guinevere Glasfurd. 2022
'Tightly plotted and hugely readable' Jane Rogers, author of PROMISED LANDS'Marvellous . . . fans of immersive historical fiction, the…
18th century, all things French and a dash of peril, this one's for you' Emily Brand, author of THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF BYRON'Glasfurd deftly, elegantly captures this volatile world of impoverished attic rooms and gilded literary salons' DAILY MAIL'I thought of the books we carried and the hands that would one day hold them. The pages read, turned and discussed. And how the book would become thought and the thought then become the person gone out into the world. Let Gilbert try and put a stop to that.'After her father is disgraced, Delphine Vimond is cast out of her home in Rouen and flees to Paris. Into her life tumbles Chancery Smith, apprentice printer sent from London to discover the mysterious author of potentially incendiary papers marked only D. In a battle of wits with the French censor, Henri Gilbert, Delphine and Chancery set off in a frantic search for D's author. But who is D and does D even exist?Privilege is a story of adventure and mishap set against the turmoil of mid-18th century France at odds with the absolute power of the King who is determined to suppress opposition on pain of death. At a time when books required royal privilege before they could be published - a system enforced by the Chief Censor and a network of spies - many were censored or banned, and their authors harshly punished. Books that fell foul of the system were published outside France and smuggled back in at great risk.Costa-shortlisted author Guinevere Glasfurd has conjured a vibrant world of entitlement and danger, where the right to live and think freely could come at the highest cost.Steel city love song: extraordinary moments in ordinary lives
By Ann McKenna Fromm. 2007
Honors the author's city Pittsburgh and her family in dramatic stories about family members, doctors, paramedics, and ordinary Pittsburghers. Demonstrating…
insight and compassion, these articles are a "moving tribute to the human spirit."Not without laughter
By Langston Hughes. 1995
Quicksand and Passing (American Women Writers)
By Nella Larsen. 1986
"Quicksand and Passing are novels I will never forget. They open up a whole world of experience and struggle that…
seemed to me, when I first read them years ago, absolutely absorbing, fascinating, and indispensable."--Alice Walker "Discovering Nella Larsen is like finding lost money with no name on it. One can enjoy it with delight and share it without guilt." --Maya Angelou "A hugely influential and insightful writer." --The New York Times "Larsen's heroines are complex, restless, figures, whose hungers and frustrations will haunt every sensitive reader. Quicksand and Passing are slender novels with huge themes." -- Sarah Waters "A tantalizing mix of moral fable and sensuous colorful narrative, exploring female sexuality and racial solidarity."-Women's Studies International Forum Rutgers' all-time bestselling book, Nella Larsen's novels Quicksand (1928) and Passing (1929) document the historical realities of Harlem in the 1920s and shed a bright light on the social world of the black bourgeoisie. The novels' greatest appeal and achievement, however, is not sociological, but psychological. As noted in the editor's comprehensive introduction, Larsen takes the theme of psychic dualism, so popular in Harlem Renaissance fiction, to a higher and more complex level, displaying a sophisticated understanding and penetrating analysis of black female psychology.Red at the Bone: Longlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2020
By Jacqueline Woodson. 2019
THE TIMES '100 BEST SUMMER READS'NEW YORK TIMES TOP 10 BESTSELLERLONGLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE 2020'Sublime' Candice Carty-Williams'An epic in…
miniature' Tayari Jones 'A banger' Ta-Nehisi Coates'Generous and big-hearted' Brit Bennett 'A true spell of a book' Ocean Vuong 'A proclamation' R.O. Kwon'A little masterpiece' Paula Hawkins'I adored this book' Elizabeth MacNeal'Pure poetry' Observer'A sharply focused gem' Sunday Times'Will remind you why you love reading' Stylist'Haunting' Guardian'A wonderful, tragic, inspiring story' Metro'Prose that sings off the page... Gorgeous' Mail on Sunday'A nuanced portrait of shifting family relationships' Financial Times'As seductive as a Prince bop' O, The Oprah Magazine'Razor-sharp' Vanity Fair'Dazzling... With urgent, vital insights into questions of class, gender, race, history, queerness and sex' New York Times An unexpected teenage pregnancy brings together two families from different social classes, and exposes the private hopes, disappointments and longings that can bind or divide us. From the New York Times-bestselling and National Book Award-winning author of Another Brooklyn and Brown Girl Dreaming. Brooklyn, 2001. It is the evening of sixteen-year-old Melody's coming of age ceremony in her grandparents' brownstone. Watched lovingly by her relatives and friends, making her entrance to the music of Prince, she wears a special custom-made dress - the very same dress that was sewn for a different wearer, Melody's mother, for a celebration that ultimately never took place.Unfurling the history of Melody's family - from the 1921 Tulsa race massacre to post 9/11 New York - Red at the Bone explores sexual desire, identity, class, and the life-altering facts of parenthood, as it looks at the ways in which young people must so often make fateful decisions about their lives before they have even begun to figure out who they are and what they want to be. *** ONE OF THE BOOKS OF THE YEAR FOR: New York Times; Washington Post; Time; USA Today; O, The Oprah Magazine; Elle; Good Housekeeping; Esquire; NPR; New York Public Library; Library Journal; Kirkus; BookRiot; She Reads; The Undefeated ***Misfit: autistic. gay. immigrant. changemaker.
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.comThe Marrow of Tradition: Large Print (Dover Thrift Editions)
By Charles W. Chesnutt. 2020
In this landmark tale, one of the great American novelists exposed the harsh dimensions of Southern prejudice during post–Reconstruction era.…
Charles W. Chesnutt traces the intertwined lives of two prominent families: one headed by a newspaper editor and flagrant white supremacist; the other by the founder of a hospital for African Americans, whose biracial wife is the unacknowledged half-sister of the editor's wife. Their personal dramas unfold amid an atmosphere of public hysteria that erupts in a massacre — one based on an actual incident. The 1898 race riot of Wilmington, North Carolina, left a considerable number of African Americans dead and expelled thousands more from their homes. Chesnutt drew upon survivors' accounts, including those of members of his own family, for an authentic retelling of the facts. His powerful and passionate exploration of how miscegenation, social rank, and the concept of white supremacy gave rise to Jim Crow laws provides an insightful analysis of racial conflict at the turn of the twentieth century.The Invisible Life of Euridice Gusmao
By Martha Batalha. 2017
'Zesty' Daily Mail 'A real gem of a book' Stylist A wickedly funny tale of two rebellious sisters in 1940s…
Rio de Janeiro Euridice is bright and ambitious. But this is Brazil in the 1940s, and society expects her to be a loving wife and mother. While Antenor is busy congratulating himself on his excellent catch, Euridice spends her humdrum days ironing his shirts and removing the lumps of onion from his food, dreaming of the success she could have made of herself – as a writer, dressmaker or culinary whizz – in another life. Her free-spirited sister Guida, on the other hand, is the kind of person who was 'born knowing everything'. When she returns from her failed elopement with stories of heartbreak and loss, the lives of Euridice and her husband are thrown into confusion, with disastrous consequences. The Invisible Life of Euridice Gusmao is a darkly comic debut, bursting with vibrant Brazilian spirit and unforgettable characters – a jubilant novel about the emancipation of women.The Story of an African Farm
By Olive Schreiner. 1998
A searing indictment of the rigid Boer social conventions of the 19th century, the first great South African novel chronicles…
the adventures of 3 childhood friends who defy societal repression. The novel's unorthodox views on religion and marriage aroused widespread controversy upon its 1883 publication.A Canadian Bankclerk
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)The Heroic Slave
By Frederick Douglass. 2015
First published nearly a decade prior to the Civil War, The Heroic Slave is the only fictional work by abolitionist,…
orator, author, and social reformer Frederick Douglass, himself a former slave. It is inspired by the true story of Madison Washington, who, along with eighteen others, took control of the slave ship Creole in November 1841 and sailed it to Nassau in the British colony of the Bahamas, where they could live free. This new critical edition, ideal for classroom use, includes the full text of Douglass's fictional recounting of the most successful slave revolt in American history, as well as an interpretive introduction; excerpts from Douglass's correspondence, speeches, and editorials; short selections by other writers on the Creole rebellion; and recent criticism on the novella. Includes editing and supporting material by Robert S. Levine, John R. Mckivigan, Professor John StaufferFive Gentlemen of Japan
By Frank Gibney. 2002
A newspaperman, an ex-Navy vice-admiral, a steel worker, a farmer, and the 124th Emperor of Japan himself-these are the fascinating…
heroes of Gibney's brilliant book about modern Japan. Strongly individual, everyone of them, the five yet share the common inheritance of Japan's precocious but unstable past.Through their lives and attitudes, Gibney gives us an invaluable analysis of this new sovereign nation so suddenly thrown into the world's power conflicts. He helps us understand the historical and social forces which make Japan what she is today-the old contracts and loyalties from which each of the Five Gentlemen is struggling to free himself and his country. Their courageous efforts to weld a new Japan from the remains of the old society, and to come to terms with the present, is as exciting as it is important. For, should they succeed, great hope for the free world lies in their success.When My Name Was Keoko
By Linda Sue Park. 2002
Sun-hee and her older brother, Tae-yul, live in Korea with their parents. Because Korea is under Japanese occupation, the children…
study Japanese and speak it at school. Their own language, their flag, the folktales Uncle tells them-even their names-are all part of the Korean culture that is now forbidden. When World War II comes to Korea, Sun-hee is surprised that the Japanese expect their Korean subjects to fight on their side. But the greatest shock of all comes when Tae-yul enlists in the Japanese army in an attempt to protect Uncle, who is suspected of aiding the Korean resistance. Sun-hee stays behind, entrusted with the life-and-death secrets of a family at war.Amazing Business People - A Short eBook
By Charles Margerison. 2011
Business makes the world go round. This unique audio collection from The Amazing People Club explores the lives of four…
amazing people who all enjoyed global success in a variety of ways. Get an insight into the life of Henry Ford, the man behind one of the biggest car brands in the world. Born on a farm, Henry's journey took him to Detroit, where he built the first mass produced vehicles - the Model T, the Model A and the system of 'Fordism'. His talent for invention and machines was inspired by other amazing individuals, including Thomas Edison. Also meet Beulah Henry, called 'Lady Edison' by many; she was a prolific inventor. Many people have actually never heard of her despite her development of over 101 inventions! Be amazed by Henry Bessemer who played a critical role in steel making and steam engines which drove the industrial revolution and find out about George de Mestral whose ingenuity was responsible for Velcro, now used all over the world. It's a great example of the fact that behind every invention, there is an amazing story! Each story comes to life through BioViews®. These are short biographical narratives, similar to interviews. They provide an easy way of learning about amazing people who made major contributions and changed our world.Amazing Millionaires - A Short eBook
By Charles Margerison. 2011
You may know the names of famous millionaires and wonder how they struck it rich. This unique collection of short…
audio stories from The Amazing People Club tells their tales. It explores the lives of four amazing millionaires and follows them on their amazing journeys to fame and fortune. Meet Cesar Ritz, the man behind the term 'Ritzy', whose life was just that. He came to be known as the 'king of hoteliers, and hotelier to kings'. Also, meet the man behind the Nobel Prizes. Alfred Nobel's life, often shrouded in mystery, comes to life through his BioViews® as we explore his career as a chemist, engineer, innovator, and armaments manufacturer. Unknown to many people, he actually invented dynamite! Meet Howard Hughes - aviator, engineer, industrialist, film producer, film director and philanthropist who became who became one of the wealthiest people in the world. Another fascinating character is Henry Wellcome. He may have saved your life with the medicines he produced. The Wellcome Trust is one of the largest medical charities in the world. Each story is unique and amazing and could perhaps be just what you need for inspiration to achieve your own ambitions. Each story comes to life through BioViews®. These are short biographical narratives, similar to interviews. They provide an easy way of learning about amazing people who made major contributions and changed our world.