Download or read book All the Fierce Tethers written by Lia Purpura and published by Sarabande Books. This book was released on 2019-04-09 with total page 82 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Readers familiar with Lia Purpura’s highly praised essay collections—Becoming, On Looking, and Rough Likeness—will know she’s a master of observation, a writer obsessed with the interplay between humans and the things they see. The subject matter of All the Fierce Tethers is wonderfully varied, both low (muskrats, slugs, a stained quilt in a motel room) and lofty (shadows, prayer, the idea of beauty). In “Treatise Against Irony,” she counters this all-too modern affliction with ferocious optimism and intelligence: “The opposite of irony is nakedness.” In “My Eagles,” our nation’s symbol is viewed from all angles—nesting, flying, politicized, preserved. The essay in itself could be a small anthology. And, in a fresh move, Purpura turns to her own, racially divided Baltimore neighborhood, where a blood stain appears on a street separating East (with its Value Village) and West (with its community garden). Finalist for the National Book Critics Award, winner of the Pushcart Prize, Lia Purpura returns with a collection both sustaining and challenging.
Download or read book It Shouldn t Have Been Beautiful written by Lia Purpura and published by National Geographic Books. This book was released on 2015-09-29 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A powerful new collection from poet, essayist, and frequent New Yorker contributor Lia Purpura Lia Purpura has won national acclaim as both a poet and an essayist. The exquisitely rendered poems in this, her fourth collection, reach back to an early affinity for proverbs and riddles and the proto-poetry found in those forms. Taking on epic subjects—time and memory, metamorphosis and indeterminacy, the complicated nature of beauty, wordless states of being—each poem explores a bright, crisp, singular moment of awareness or shock or revelation. Purpura reminds us that short poems, never merely brief nor fragmentary, can transcend their size, like small dogs, espresso, a drop of mercury.
Download or read book Taste written by Jehanne Dubrow and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2022-08-23 with total page 94 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Taste is a lyric meditation on one of our five senses, which we often take for granted. Structured as a series of “small bites,” the book considers the ways that we ingest the world, how we come to know ourselves and others through the daily act of tasting. Through flavorful explorations of the sweet, the sour, the salty, the bitter, and umami, Jehanne Dubrow reflects on the nature of taste. In a series of short, interdisciplinary essays, she blends personal experience with analysis of poetry, fiction, music, and the visual arts, as well as religious and philosophical texts. Dubrow considers the science of taste and how taste transforms from a physical sensation into a metaphor for discernment. Taste is organized not so much as a linear dinner served in courses but as a meal consisting of meze, small plates of intensely flavored discourse.
Download or read book Somewhere a Woman Lowers the Hem of Her Skirt written by Laurie Rachkus Uttich and published by . This book was released on 2022-05 with total page 100 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Somewhere, a Woman Lowers the Hem of Her Skirt is a collection of poems that takes the reader on a journey through life as a woman breaking free from the constraints of a quiet, midwestern life, to fighting battles for equality, to raising boys in a harsh society, to teaching students and making connections in a unjust world. These poems are about hope and happiness and heartache and finding your way home. Every single poem in this gorgeous collection seems to spring whole from a moment of achingly sharp perception. Uttich writes directly into Adrienne Rich's "dream of a common language" - that place where the impossibility of connection is breached by love, and care, and justice. "I want to write a happy poem..." she says... "something that would never/use the words silver-lining" and indeed no easy hope is offered. Something far greater is kindled in her words, though - the precious shimmer of the world as it is in all its violence and unbidden joy. Few poets are natural makers of stunning endings; Uttich is one of them. Her poems never speechify or slip delicately away; rather they offer a vision of the depths possible if one is brave enough to stay close to hard truths, ask - and wait for - wisdom, and witness with awe and tenderness. Lia Purpura, author of four poetry and four essay collections, including It Shouldn't Have Been Beautiful (2015) and All The Fierce Tethers: Essays (2019) These poems will take you out, spin you around, and teach you just how important a woman's life is. They'll remind you of the distance between where you grew up and where you live now, and then they'll collapse that distance so you see who you are is everyone you've ever been. And they'll do all that with breathless grace, humor, and compassion. Katherine Riegel, author of two poetry collections: What the Mouth Was Made For (2013) and Castaway (2010) Laurie Rachkus Uttich's collection feels like the best kind of church. I want to shout, "Hallelujah! Amen!" at the end of each poem. Her words rock with hymns of struggle, love, family, community, and "girl power." And while they build us up, they also remind us of our responsibility to call out unjust systems and to walk alongside everyone who crosses our paths. It's an invitation to embrace the authentic in ourselves and others, to love instead of judge. In all of these poems, Uttich's dazzling language avoids sentimentality and captures the raw details of life. These poems are honest, tender, rugged, and unflinching. Terry Ann Thaxton, author of three poetry collections: Mud Song (2017), The Terrible Wife (2014), and Getaway Girl (2011)
Download or read book Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls written by T Kira Madden and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2019-03-05 with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “The book I wish I'd had growing up.” -Chanel Miller, author of Know My Name Best Books of 2019: Esquire O, The Oprah Magazine Variety Lit Hub Book Riot Electric Literature Autostraddle Finalist: NBCC John Leonard First Book Prize Lambda Literary Award New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice Selection Paste Best Memoirs of the Decade Elle Best Books of the Season Washington Post Best Books of the Month Indie Next Pick Indies Introduce Pick "A fearless debut." -New York Times "[A] gorgeous reckoning." -Washington Post "Flat out breathtaking." -Lit Hub "Gripping and gloriously written." -Elle "Utterly unforgettable." -NYLON "Unnervingly satisfying." -Oprah Magazine "Deeply compassionate." -NPR.org "Truly stunning." -Cosmopolitan Acclaimed literary essayist T Kira Madden's raw and redemptive debut memoir is about coming of age and reckoning with desire as a queer, biracial teenager amidst the fierce contradictions of Boca Raton, Florida, a place where she found cult-like privilege, shocking racial disparities, rampant white-collar crime, and powerfully destructive standards of beauty hiding in plain sight. As a child, Madden lived a life of extravagance, from her exclusive private school to her equestrian trophies and designer shoe-brand name. But under the surface was a wild instability. The only child of parents continually battling drug and alcohol addictions, Madden confronted her environment alone. Facing a culture of assault and objectification, she found lifelines in the desperately loving friendships of fatherless girls. With unflinching honesty and lyrical prose, spanning from 1960s Hawai'i to the present-day struggle of a young woman mourning the loss of a father while unearthing truths that reframe her reality, Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls is equal parts eulogy and love letter. It's a story about trauma and forgiveness, about families of blood and affinity, both lost and found, unmade and rebuilt, crooked and beautiful. One of the Most Anticipated Books of the Year: Entertainment Weekly, Huffington Post, BuzzFeed, The Millions, Nylon, The Rumpus, Electric Literature, Lit Hub, Refinery29, and many more
Download or read book Terroir written by Natasha Sajé and published by Trinity University Press. This book was released on 2020-11-26 with total page 156 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The word “terroir” refers to the climate and soil in which something is grown. Natasha Sajé applies this idea to the environments that nurture and challenge us, exploring in particular how the immigrant experience has shaped her identity. She revisits people and literature across her life, including her experiences as the child of European refugees in suburban New Jersey, taken under the wing of a widowed neighbor; a winter spent waitressing in Switzerland; her marriage to a Jamaican man in Baltimore; and finally her marriage to a woman in Salt Lake City. This memoir-in-essays combines poetic lyricism with incisive commentary on nationality, race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, and class. Reminding us that change is constant in our lives, Sajé asks how terroir creates identity. Throughout, the English language is her most fertile ground.
Download or read book Property written by Valerie Martin and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2007-12-18 with total page 210 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: WINNER OF THE ORANGE PRIZE • Set in 1828 on a Louisiana sugar plantation, this novel from the bestselling author of Mary Reilly presents a “fresh, unsentimental look at what slave-owning does to (and for) one's interior life.... The writing—so prised and clean limbed—is a marvel" (Toni Morrison, Nobel Prize-winning author of Beloved). Manon Gaudet, pretty, bitterly intelligent, and monstrously self-absorbed, seethes under the dominion of her boorish husband. In particular his relationship with her slave Sarah, who is both his victim and his mistress. Exploring the permutations of Manon’s own obsession with Sarah against the backdrop of an impending slave rebellion, Property unfolds with the speed and menace of heat lightning, casting a startling light from the past upon the assumptions we still make about the powerful and powerful.
Download or read book The Given Day written by Dennis Lehane and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2009-10-06 with total page 574 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Gut-wrenching force...A majestic, fiery epic. The Given Day is a huge, impassioned, intensively researched book that brings history alive." - The New York Times Dennis Lehane, the New York Times bestselling author of Live by Night—now a Warner Bros. movie starring Ben Affleck—offers an unflinching family epic that captures the political unrest of a nation caught between a well-patterned past and an unpredictable future. This beautifully written novel of American history tells the story of two families—one black, one white—swept up in a maelstrom of revolutionaries and anarchists, immigrants and ward bosses, Brahmins and ordinary citizens, all engaged in a battle for survival and power at the end of World War I.
Download or read book A Court of Crows written by Eliza Eveland and published by . This book was released on 2022-01-31 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A young queen in peril.A city under siege. An elven mercenary with a dark desire. Nineteen-year-old Eris Telari was never supposed to rule Brucia. She's always been more interested in swordplay than courtly intrigue. After her brother's assassination, however, Eris has no choice but to take up the crown and defend her city against an invasion led by an undefeated elven warlord. With Brucia's forces decimated, and a siege looming, Eris needs help. Who better to repel the elven invaders than a band of elven mercenaries? Their leader, Ruith, is as charming as he is deadly, and used to getting what he wants. Six thousand swords strong, his Crows have a reputation for winning against impossible odds. He won't take a fight he can't win, and now he has his sights set on Eris?Is it her kingdom he wants? Or her? With assassins and traitors still lurking around every corner, and an army nearly twenty thousand strong at her gates, Eris cannot afford to turn away the Crows' assistance. Even with their help, the battle for Brucia will be hard-won. And the most dangerous threat may already be inside her walls and vying for a place at her side?
Download or read book Increase written by Lia Purpura and published by University of Georgia Press. This book was released on 2015-03-15 with total page 152 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Increase is Lia Purpura’s chronicle of her pregnancy, the birth of her son, Joseph, and the first year of his life. She recounts her journey with the heightened awareness of a mother-to-be and through the eyes of a poet, from the moment she confirms her pregnancy as “A blue X slowly crosses itself, first one arm, then the other in the small white window of the test,” through “the X of his crossed feet in sleep” as her child’s world begins. Purpura’s sensibility transcends the facts of personal experience to enfold the dramatically changing shape of a larger, complex world. These closely knit essays portray the rhythms of a new mother’s life as it is challenged and transformed in nearly every aspect, from the emotions of wildness, loss, need, and desire to the outward progress--and interruption--of her work and activities. Increase offers us motherhood at an extraordinary pitch, recording, absorbing, and revisiting experiences from a multitude of angles. Purpura presents her story of discovery with unequaled eloquence, grace, and power.
Download or read book Defying Limits written by Dave Williams and published by Simon & Schuster. This book was released on 2019-10-01 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: INSTANT NATIONAL BESTSELLER An inspirational, uplifting, and life-affirming memoir about passion, resilience, and living life to the fullest, from Dr. Dave Williams, one of Canada’s most accomplished astronauts. I had dreamt about becoming an astronaut from the time I watched Alan Shepard launch on the first American sub-orbital flight on May 5, 1961. Eleven days before my seventh birthday, I committed to a new goal: one day, I would fly in outer space. Dr. Dave has led the sort of life that most people only dream of. He has set records for spacewalking. He has lived undersea for weeks at a time. He has saved lives as an emergency doctor, launched into the stratosphere twice, and performed surgery in zero gravity. But if you ask him how he became so accomplished, he’ll say: “I’m just a curious kid from Saskatchewan.” Curious indeed. Dr. Dave never lost his desire to explore nor his fascination with the world. Whether he was exploring the woods behind his childhood home or floating in space at the end of the Canadarm, Dave tried to see every moment of his life as filled with beauty and meaning. He learned to scuba dive at only twelve years old, became a doctor despite academic struggles as an undergraduate, and overcame stiff odds and fierce competition to join the ranks of the astronauts he had idolized as a child. There were setbacks and challenges along the way—the loss of friends in the Columbia disaster, a cancer diagnosis that nearly prevented him from returning to space—but through it all, Dave never lost sight of his goal. And when he finally had the chance to fly among the stars, he came to realize that although the destination can be spectacular, it’s the journey that truly matters. In Defying Limits, Dave shares the events that have defined his life, showing us that whether we’re gravity-defying astronauts or earth-bound terrestrials, we can all live an infinite, fulfilled life by relishing the value and importance of each moment. The greatest fear that we all face is not the fear of dying, but the fear of never having lived. Each of us is greater than we believe. And, together, we can exceed our limits to soar farther and higher than we ever imagined.
Download or read book Shielded written by KayLynn Flanders and published by Ember. This book was released on 2021-06-22 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For fans of Sorcery of Thorns and Furyborn comes a thrilling new fantasy about a kingdom ravaged by war, and the princess who might be the key to saving not only those closest to her, but the kingdom itself, if she reveals the very secret that could destroy her. The kingdom of Hálendi is in trouble. It's losing the war at its borders, and rumors of a new, deadlier threat on the horizon have surfaced. Princess Jennesara knows her skills on the battlefield would make her an asset and wants to help, but her father has other plans. As the second-born heir to the throne, Jenna lacks the firstborn's--her brother's--magical abilities, so the king promises her hand in marriage to the prince of neighboring Turia in exchange for resources Hálendi needs. Jenna must leave behind everything she has ever known if she is to give her people a chance at peace. Only, on the journey to reach her betrothed and new home, the royal caravan is ambushed, and Jenna realizes the rumors were wrong--the new threat is worse than anyone imagined. Now Jenna must decide if revealing a dangerous secret is worth the cost before it's too late--for her and for her entire kingdom. A Whitney Award Nominee "A gorgeous fantasy that captivates from beginning to end."--KATHRYN PURDIE, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Burning Glass and Bone Crier's Moon "YA fantasy at its most fun."--DANA SWIFT, author of Cast in Firelight
Download or read book Scream written by Lia Purpura and published by Literary House Press. This book was released on 2017 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This essay first appeared in The Georgia Review (Fall 2015 issue), copyright 2015 by Lia Purpura, used by permission of author. It was also awarded a Pushcart Prize in 2016."
Download or read book The Book of Beginnings and Endings written by Jenny Boully and published by . This book was released on 2007 with total page 80 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The third collection from this thrillingly innovative master of the lyric essay.
Download or read book If the House written by Molly Spencer and published by Wisconsin Poetry. This book was released on 2019 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Winner of The Brittingham Prize in Poetry"--Cover.
Download or read book All Woman and Springtime written by B.W. Jones and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2012-05-01 with total page 409 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the tradition of A THOUSAND SPLENDID SUNS, a sweeping tale of friendship, hardship and redemption set in North Korea. Gi lives behind North Korea's iron curtain under the watchful eye of Dear Leader. As an orphan, growing up on a diet of thin soup and propaganda, life is a constant struggle against hunger and fear. But when she meets headstrong Il-sun, tender Gi finds consolation in another human being for the first time, and their unlikely friendship grows as deep as the bond between sisters. Everything changes when they fall victim to a people trafficker and are indentured into the sex trade, first south of the border and then in America. The hardships they face on their journey from East to West test them to the very limits of what it is possible to endure. Perfect for fans of Khaled Hosseini and Chris Cleave, heart-wrenching but ultimately redemptive, ALL WOMAN AND SPRINGTIME provides an unforgettable insight into the most mysterious and unknown country on earth, and in Gi paints a portrait of a young woman who loses everything but refuses to be destroyed.
Download or read book Bestiary written by Elise Paschen and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page 82 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The ... third volume from Paschen ... pursues the likenesses between human beings and other sorts of beasts: Paschen watches domestic animals, visits zoos and backyards, and records the instincts that animate her, as lover, mother, daughter and citizen. Husband and wife “share a wedded habitat”; a mother breastfeeding her daughter “would like to buzz / into the orchid of your ear,” while a manatee looks to the poet like “a mistaken mermaid, / on the brink of vanishing from sight.” Paschen offers sonnets, villanelles and even a ghazal, in which butterflies in an exhibit “invent a sky beneath the dome.” Readers might remember not the moments of pure description, but the difficult emotions Paschen describes in her poems about marital love, motherhood and finally a daughter’s grief. The urn with her father’s ashes dominates one poem, and her mother’s career as a ballet dancer takes over another: “Mother, when I was young, I watched / you from the wings and saw the sweat,” Paschen writes, saw “your gasp / for breath. I thought it was your last.” If we are animals, Paschen suggests, we are the animals who look hard at one another, the animals who remember and who mourn"--From Publisher's weekly, January 2009.
