Download or read book Port Tropique written by Barry Gifford and published by Seven Stories Press. This book was released on 2011-01-04 with total page 178 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Revolution is simmering in the heat of battered Central American town Port Tropique, where protagonist Franz Hall is an "intellectual Meursault in a paranoid Hemingway landscape, a self-conscious Conradian adventurer, a Lord Jim in the earliest stages of selfwilled failure" (New York Times). The ineffectual hero spends his days drinking and observing people in the zócalo, and occasional nights involved in an ivory-smuggling operation threatened by impending government siege. Always persistent are memories of Marie and what was lost. In this sinuous narrative of dislocation and remorse, Barry Gifford details Franz’s mundanity and the bizarre cast of characters swirling around him.
Download or read book The Best Novels of the Nineties written by Linda Parent Lesher and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2015-11-17 with total page 489 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This reader’s guide provides uniquely organized and up-to-date information on the most important and enjoyable contemporary English-language novels. Offering critically substantiated reading recommendations, careful cross-referencing, and extensive indexing, this book is appropriate for both the weekend reader looking for the best new mystery and the full-time graduate student hoping to survey the latest in magical realism. More than 1,000 titles are included, each entry citing major reviews and giving a brief description for each book.
Download or read book Village Voices written by Odile Hellier and published by Seven Stories Press. This book was released on 2024-09-24 with total page 447 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A celebration of the legacy of the Village Voice bookshop in Paris, founded by Odile Hellier in 1982—a hub of social life and a refuge for artists, writers, and anglophone literary life for over three decades until it closed in 2012. “My entire sense of Paris centers on Odile and the bookshop.” —Richard Ford "For literature lovers, it’s a feast." —Publishers Weekly In July of 1982, on a quiet boulevard just off the bustling Boulevard Saint-German, Odile Hellier opened the Village Voice Bookshop. Over the next three decades, the blue-shuttered shop would become one of the most famous English-language bookstores in Paris—a vivacious hub for artists, writers, and a haven for anglophone literary life. After the its closing, Odile found herself with hundreds of tapes of various talks given at the bookshop by the greatest artists of their generation. These voices from the past were the spontaneous exchanges of literary and cultural icons such as Susan Sontag, Margaret Atwood, Don DeLillo, Allen Ginsberg, Toni Morrison, Michael Ondaatje, Jim Harrison, Barry Gifford, Adrienne Rich, David Sedaris, Amy Tan, Edmund White, Art Spiegelman, and Stephen Spender, all of whom were drawn to Odile’s tiny bookstore on Rue Princesse. This carefully curated historical archive is an enduring conversation across time, and a memoir of one woman’s beloved store. “… when you squeezed into the narrow event space on the Voice’s upper floor, French and international book lovers mingled with Parisian editors and publishers, shared a glass of wine, a new discovery, a heretical opinion, and took the conversation outside to the sidewalk of the Rue Princesse, for another shared pleasure: an unguilty cigarette.” — Livia Manera, The New Yorker “A stroll from rue de l’Odéon, Les Deux Magots or the Luxembourg Gardens, the hanging sign reads Village Voice: Anglo-American Bookshop. The narrow door and window frames are painted Greek island blue… Lingering a while in front of the window display, you’ll want to dive inside, into an ocean of story.” —Hazel Rowley, Bookforum
Download or read book The Rooster Trapped in the Reptile Room written by Barry Gifford and published by Seven Stories Press. This book was released on 2011-01-04 with total page 484 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Everything I have to say about race and religion and politics is in the novels," declares Barry Gifford. The Rooster Trapped in the Reptile Room gathers generous portions of all thirteen novels and novellas, as well as first-person essays, generous helpings of poetry, journalism, and a new interview with the author. The broad contours of an episodic output emerge—a full-length view of the freaks and freakish incidents that populate Gifford’s unique human comedy. A world, as Lula, the author’s favorite of all his characters, reflects, "wild at heart and weird on top." The Rooster Trapped in the Reptile Room provides essential reading for anyone after the soul of American writing.
Download or read book Out of the Past written by Barry Gifford and published by Univ. Press of Mississippi. This book was released on 1988 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Beyond Twisted Sorrow written by Jay A. Gertzman and published by Down & Out Books. This book was released on 2022-10-17 with total page 166 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Twentieth-century mass produced pulp crime usually ends with the protagonists unable to rid themselves of the presence of forces that inhibit professional or emotional growth. Stoic perseverance is often their acknowledgement of the power of fate. The diverse, still-emerging genre of Country (or Redneck, Ridgerunner, or Ozark) noir is marked by protagonists who have an instinct for community as a coherent territory and recreate the possibly self-destructive but stubbornly self-assertive traits that characterized what Greil Marcus called “the old, weird America.” Rural fiction’s protagonists struggle to replace a set of convictions which no longer sustain community or family. Often enough, their struggles produce a generational survival of perseverance, family and clan mutuality, the need for passing tough tests, and spirituality. They often wind up “far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow” (Dylan’s “Tambourine Man”).
Download or read book American Falls written by Barry Gifford and published by Seven Stories Press. This book was released on 2011-01-04 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: American Falls is the first major collection of short stories from Barry Gifford, master of the dark side of the American reality. These stories range widely in style and period, from the 1950s to the present, from absurdist exercises to romantic tales, from stories about childhood innocence to novellas of murder and revenge. In the title story, a Japanese-American motel operator chooses not give up a total stranger, a black man wanted for murder, when the police come searching for him. In "Room 584, The Starr Hotel," a man rants his outrage at an amorous couple in the room next door before he himself is arrested for having committed multiple murders. "The Unspoken" recounts the confessions of a man without a mouth who tells about the woman who loved him. And in this collection’s longest fiction, a novella called "The Lonely and the Lost," a small town’s talented and colorful inhabitants solve their problems as best they can until it comes time for the devil to reap what they have sown. Dark and light intermix in masterful chiaroscuro, dark becoming light, light revealing sinister or brooding complexity. No simple endings, only happy beginnings.
Download or read book Arena Two written by Stuart Christie and published by PM Press. This book was released on 2011-02-15 with total page 215 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the second issue of Arena we aim to provide general insights into the role of the anarchist in fiction, both as protagonist and author. David Weir’s essay “Anarchist Fiction, Anarchist Sensibilities” focuses on the progenitor of anarchist fiction, William Godwin’s Caleb Williams, published in 1794, that demonstrated the pressing need for the utopian system he described in the first systematic elaboration of anarchist philosophy, Enquiry Concerning Political Justice. “Epic Pooh” is a newly updated revision of a 1978 article by Michael Moorcock reviewing epic fantasy literature for children, particularly J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. While researching early twentieth-century French anarchist plays translated into Italian, Santo Catanuto discovered interesting information on the literary side of the Communard Louise Michel, indicating that she was the author of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea. Stephen Schwartz, a longtime critic of the detective novel, evaluates the arc of French writer Leo Malet from anarchist to arabophobe and in “Between Libel And Hoax,” counters Miguel Mir’s libelous depiction of the Spanish anarchist movement, Entre el roig i el negre. In his discourse on B. Traven’s The Death Ship, Ernest Larsen looks at the intractable modern problem of identity. Larsen’s short story “Bakunin At The Beach” is about Mr. and Mrs. Bakunin holidaying at Lake Maggiore under the watchful eyes of Inspector Dupin of the Swiss Department of Justice and Police. Joseph Conrad’s short story “An Anarchist: A Desperate Tale” is republished here from A Set of Six (1908). “Anarchists in Fiction” is a collection of idiosyncratic reviews of books in which anarchists are portrayed as an eclectic group of villains and criminal degenerates. Finally, we conclude this second issue of Arena with an article by our cinema editor Richard Porton on Dušan Makavejev’s playful, allusive 1971 film WR: Mysteries of the Organism.
Download or read book The Imagination of the Heart written by Barry Gifford and published by Seven Stories Press. This book was released on 2011-01-04 with total page 119 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Imagination of the Heart is the final chapter in the saga of Sailor Ripley and Lula Pace Fortune, the "Romeo and Juliet of the Deep South." Their story began in Barry Gifford's novel Wild at Heart, which in 1990 was made into a Palme d'Or–winning feature film by David Lynch. Following Sailor’s death at the age of sixty-five in New Orleans, Lula moved back to her home state of North Carolina. This novel begins fifteen years later when Lula, at age eighty, decides to write a memoir in diary form, reflecting on her life with Sailor while also keeping a journal describing her last road trip: a journey with Beany Thorn, her best friend since childhood, back to New Orleans. Like a contemporary book of Revelations, dutifully recorded by Lula as a dialogue between self and soul, it becomes a bittersweet, often dangerous journey into the imagination of the heart, and what may lie beyond. Also included in this edition is "The Truth is in the Work," a conversation between Barry Gifford and Noel King which delves into a range of topics, from Gifford’s early publishing experiences to his film projects and to professional sports.
Download or read book Agent of Empire written by Brady Harrison and published by University of Georgia Press. This book was released on 2004 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At the heart of our ongoing interest in Walker, says Harrison, is the need to understand the ever-shifting ambitions and arguments that have driven American economic, military, and paramilitary ventures around the globe for the past 150 years.".
Download or read book Night People written by Barry Gifford and published by Grove Press. This book was released on 1992 with total page 214 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The author of Wild at Heart and The Wild Life of Sailor and Lula writes of what Tennessee Williams called "something wild in the country/that only the night people know." He draws his characters from the shadows of the Deep South, where they confront the chaotic horror of the United States at the end of the twentieth century.
Download or read book Low Bite written by Sin Soracco and published by PM Press. This book was released on 2010-05-01 with total page 185 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Low Bite: Sin Soracco’s prison novel about survival, dignity, friendship, and insubordination. The view from inside a women’s prison isn’t a pretty one, and Morgan, the narrator, knows that as well as anyone. White, female, 26, convicted of nighttime breaking and entering with force, she works in the prison law library, giving legal counsel of more-or-mostly-less usefulness to other convicts. More useful is the hooch stash she keeps behind the law books. And she has plenty of enemies—like Johnson, the lesbian-hating warden, and Alex, the “pretty little dude” lawyer who doesn’t like her free legal advice. Then there’s Rosalie and Birdeye—serious rustlers whose loyalty lasts about as long as their cigarettes hold out. And then there’s China: Latina, female, 22, holding U.S. citizenship through marriage, convicted of conspiracy to commit murder—a dangerous woman who is safer in prison than she is on the streets. They’re all trying to get through without getting caught or going straight, but there’s just one catch—a bloodstained bank account that everybody wants, including some players on the outside. Low Bite: an underground classic reprinted at last and the first title in the new imprint from The Green Arcade.
Download or read book Perdita Durango written by Barry Gifford and published by Grove Press. This book was released on 1996 with total page 132 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bad girl Perdita Durango and her dealer boyfriend Romeo Dolorosa get their kicks on a journey from Louisiana to Los Angeles that involves santeria rituals and kidnapping.
Download or read book The Sinaloa Story written by Barry Gifford and published by Seven Stories Press. This book was released on 2011-01-04 with total page 154 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Sinaloa Story tells of DelRay Mudo and Ava Varazo, two down-and-outs looking for a reasonable life and maybe even a little redemption in a corrupt and violent world. Ava is a Mexican prostitute, beautiful and no victim of circumstance. When DelRay falls in love with her at the drive-in whorehouse where she is the prize, she seizes the chance to break free. They take off for Sinaloa ,Texas, the lone-dog state where "nothin’ good ever happens." The far-out border flunkies they meet — Thankful Priest, the one-eyed former football player; Indio Desacato, Ava’s pimp and a small-town racketeer; Arkadelphia Quantrill Smith, an octogenarian whose father marched with Shelby in the Iron Brigade; and many others — fill out the sinister and electrifying ride.
Download or read book Do the Blind Dream written by Barry Gifford and published by Seven Stories Press. This book was released on 2011-01-04 with total page 173 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Do the Blind Dream? shows Gifford at the height of his powers, navigating with ease the new, more fragmented imaginative landscape of morning-after America. Gifford seems to have anticipated themes that suddenly are recognizable everywhere: the fragility of identity; the power of coincidence; the illusion of a secure tomorrow. In contrast to his often nightmarish, satirical, groundbreaking novels of the 1990s—Wild at Heart, Perdita Durango, and Night People among them—Do the Blind Dream? continues in the tender and deeply introspective vein revealed in two recent works: Gifford’s memoir The Phantom Father (named a New York Times Notable Book), and the award-winning novella Wyoming. From the intimate, stylistically daring examination of the darkest secrets in the history of an Italian family, to the terrible but often beautiful fears and discoveries of childhood, to the sardonic, desperate confusion of adult life, Do the Blind Dream? reveals an exceptionally versatile, highly tuned sensibility.
Download or read book Snitch World written by Jim Nisbet and published by PM Press. This book was released on 2013-07-01 with total page 206 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “The Miata jumped the curb and sheared off a light pole. The impact deployed the airbags, but Chainbang was ready. He knifed Klinger’s before it was fully inflated and his own before it could crush the glass pipe in his breast pocket. The six-inch blade went through the nylon like a pit bull through a kindergarten.” Snitch World takes place in a San Francisco of menacing technology, where the old cons come up short and the crimes of the gritty night have morphed into slick capers pulled off by the glow of a smartphone. Klinger hangs out at the Hawse Hole, a sordid dive even by Tenderloin standards. All he really wants is enough cash to buy a cup of coffee, some cigarettes, a bug-free hotel room. The simple act of picking a carefully targeted mark’s pocket initiates a series of events that get stranger and more dangerous by the moment. Jim Nisbet, with his characteristic humor and brilliant prose, creates a world where trust, and even cash, are the avatars of a loser’s game. This is Snitch World, where a nine-dollar app can be as deadly as a dirty needle. Also included is a recent interview with Jim Nisbet, in conversation with Patrick Marks, owner and publisher of San Francisco’s The Green Arcade, talking about writing, books, and technology.
Download or read book 23 Shades of Black written by Kenneth Wishnia and published by PM Press. This book was released on 2012-06-01 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 23 Shades of Black is socially conscious crime fiction. It takes place in New York City in the early 1980s, i.e., the Reagan years, and was written partly in response to the reactionary discourse of the time, when the current thirty-year assault on the rights of working people began in earnest, and the divide between rich and poor deepened with the blessing of the political and corporate elites. But it is not a political tract, it’s a kick-ass novel that was nominated for the Edgar and the Anthony Awards, and made Booklist’s Best First Mysteries of the Year. The heroine, Filomena Buscarsela, is an immigrant who experienced tremendous poverty and injustice in her native Ecuador, and who grew up determined to devote her life to helping others. She tells us that she really should have been a priest, but since that avenue was closed to her, she chose to become a cop instead. The problem is that as one of the first Latinas on the NYPD, she is not just a woman in a man’s world, she is a woman of color in a white man’s world. And it’s hell. Filomena is mistreated and betrayed by her fellow officers, which leads her to pursue a case independently in the hopes of being promoted to detective for the Rape Crisis Unit. Along the way, she is required to enforce unjust drug laws that she disagrees with, and to betray her own community (which ostracizes her as a result) in an undercover operation to round up undocumented immigrants. Several scenes are set in the East Village art and punk rock scene of the time, and the murder case eventually turns into an investigation of corporate environmental crime from a working class perspective that is all-too-rare in the genre. And yet this thing is damn funny, too.
