Download or read book The Shaman of Turtle Valley written by Clifford Garstang and published by . This book was released on 2019-05-14 with total page 396 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fiction. The author of the award-winning What the Zhang Boys Know ("...utterly beautiful and unforgettable"--Kevin Wilson) now gives us a heart-rending first novel about love, displacement, and the powerful ghosts that haunt so many families. The Alexanders have farmed the land in Turtle Valley for generations, and their family and its history is tied to this mountainous region of Virginia in ways few others can claim. When Gulf War veteran Aiken Alexander brings home a young and pregnant South Korean bride, he hopes at long last to claim his own place in that complicated history--coming out from behind the shadow of his tragically killed older brother and taking up a new place in his father's affections. However, things do not go according to plan. His wife, Soon-hee, can't--or won't--adjust to life in America. When Soon-hee disappears with their son, Aiken's life and dreams truly fall apart--he loses his job, is compelled to return to the family home, and falls prey to all his worst impulses. It is at this low point that Aiken's story becomes interwoven with a dubious Alexander family history, one that pitted brother against brother and now cousin against cousin, in a perfect storm of violence and dysfunction. Drawing on Korean beliefs in spirits and shamanism, how Aiken solves these problems--both corporeal and spiritual--is at the center of this dynamic and beautifully written debut novel.

Download or read book Snow Hunters written by Paul Yoon and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2013-08-06 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A highly anticipated debut novel from 5 Under 35 National Book Foundation honoree featuring a Korean War refugee who emigrates to Brazil to become a tailor's apprentice and confronts the wreckage of his past"--

Download or read book The Right Hand Shore written by Christopher Tilghman and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2012-04-24 with total page 369 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A masterful novel that confronts the dilemmas of race, family, and forbidden love in the wake of America's Civil War Fifteen years after the publication of his acclaimed novel Mason's Retreat, Christopher Tilghman returns to the Mason family and the Chesapeake Bay in The Right-Hand Shore. It is 1920, and Edward Mason is making a call upon Miss Mary Bayly, the current owner of the legendary Mason family estate, the Retreat. Miss Mary is dying. She plans to give the Retreat to the closest direct descendant of the original immigrant owner that she can find. Edward believes he can charm the old lady, secure the estate and be back in Baltimore by lunchtime. Instead, over the course of a long day, he hears the stories that will forever bind him and his family to the land. He hears of Miss Mary's grandfather brutally selling all his slaves in 1857 in order to avoid the reprisals he believes will come with Emancipation. He hears of the doomed efforts by Wyatt Bayly, Miss Mary's father, to turn the Retreat into a vast peach orchard, and of Miss Mary and her brother growing up in a fractured and warring household. He learns of Abel Terrell, son of free blacks who becomes head orchardist, and whose family becomes intimately connected to the Baylys and to the Mason legacy. The drama in this richly textured novel proceeds through vivid set pieces: on rural nineteenth-century industry; on a boyhood on the Eastern Shore of Maryland; on the unbreakable divisions of race and class; and, finally, on two families attempting to save a son and a daughter from the dangers of their own innocent love. The result is a radiant work of deep insight and peerless imagination about the central dilemma of American history. The Right-Hand Shore is a New York Times Notable Book of 2012.

Download or read book If I Had Two Wings Stories written by Randall Kenan and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2020-08-04 with total page 145 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Finalist for 2020 National Book Critics Circle Award in Fiction Longlisted for the 2020 National Book Award for Fiction Finalist for the 2021 Aspen Words Literary Prize Mingling the earthy with the otherworldly, these ten stories chronicle ineffable events in ordinary lives. In Kenan’s fictional territory of Tims Creek, North Carolina, an old man rages in his nursing home, a parson beats up an adulterer, a rich man is haunted by a hog, and an elderly woman turns unwitting miracle worker. A retired plumber travels to Manhattan, where Billy Idol sweeps him into his entourage. An architect who lost his famous lover to AIDS reconnects with a high-school fling. Howard Hughes seeks out the woman who once cooked him butter beans. Shot through with humor and seasoned by inventiveness and maturity, Kenan riffs on appetites of all kinds, on the eerie persistence of history, and on unstoppable lovers and unexpected salvations. If I Had Two Wings is a rich chorus of voices and visions, dreams and prophecies, marked by physicality and spirit. Kenan’s prose is nothing short of wondrous.

Download or read book Algorithms written by Sid Balman and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2023-08-01 with total page 158 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This final novel in the acclaimed Seventh Flag Trilogy thrusts readers thirty years into the future—a dystopic reality of regional fiefdoms, marauding scavengers, and the quest for ultimate power: the Algorithms of everything, which have been secretly pilfered from an undersea Internet cable, stored on hard drives, and implanted in the last surviving blue whale. Ademar Zarkan—the iconic and unlikely heroine of the American West, now a seventy-year-old woman—leads the Free People of West Texas in an alliance with Native Americans and the indigenous people of northern Mexico to retrieve the hard drives and to rescue her clairvoyant granddaughter from the radicalized Sisterhood and its merciless leader, Mother. But they aren’t the only ones in pursuit of the Algorithms. Haunting and prophetic, Algorithms is a story of violent extremism, resilience, family, and, above all, the interconnectedness of humankind and the natural world.

Download or read book Bird Medicine written by Evan T. Pritchard and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2013-05-20 with total page 287 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Explores the living spiritual tradition surrounding birds in Native American culture • Pairs scholarly research with more than 200 firsthand accounts of bird signs from traditional Native Americans and their descendants • Examines the legends, wisdom, and powers of the birds known as the gatekeepers of the four directions—Eagle, Hawk, Crow, and Owl • Provides many examples of bird sign interpretations and human-bird communication that can be applied in your own encounters with birds Birds are our strongest allies in the natural world. Revered in Native American spirituality and shamanic traditions around the world, birds are known as teachers, guardians, role models, counselors, healers, clowns, peacemakers, and meteorologists. They carry messages and warnings from loved ones and the spirit world, report deaths and injuries, and channel divine intelligence to answer our questions. Some of their “signs” are so subtle that one could discount them as subjective, but others are dramatic enough to strain even a skeptic’s definition of coincidence. Pairing scholarly research with more than 200 firsthand accounts of bird encounters from traditional Native Americans and their descendants, Evan Pritchard explores the living spiritual tradition surrounding birds in Native American culture. He examines in depth the birds known as the gatekeepers of the four directions--Eagle in the North, Hawk in the East, Crow in the South, and Owl in the West--including their roles in legends and the use of their feathers in shamanic rituals. He reveals how the eagle can be a direct messenger of the Creator, why crows gather in “Crow Councils,” and how shamans have the ability to travel inside of birds, even after death. Expanding his study to the wisdom and gifts of birds beyond the four gatekeepers, such as hummingbirds, seagulls, and the mythical thunderbird, he provides numerous examples of everyday bird sign interpretations that can be applied in your own encounters with birds as well as ways we can help protect birds and encourage them to communicate with us.

Download or read book What the Zhang Boys Know written by Clifford Garstang and published by . This book was released on 2012-10-01 with total page 218 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "What the Zhang Boys Know has a dozen chapters, each one a vivid short story in itself. Garstang makes the whole greater than the sum of its parts. The lives of the inhabitants of a condominium in Washington, D.C.'s Chinatown are told separately and as part of a web of entanglements. The entrances and exits are handled with the deftness of a French comedy, but the empathy of the author brings all the characters achingly alive. What the Zhang Boys Know is a wonderful and haunting book." - John Casey, author of Compass Rose and Spartina, winner of the National Book Award

Download or read book Murmuration written by Sid Balman and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2021-08-03 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Charlie Christmas, Ademar Zarkan, and Prometheus Stone are the best of America—united by war, scarred by displacement, and resolute in the face of the troubles that rip the nation apart over three decades. Christmas, a Somali translator with a split personality, and Zarkan, a Muslim sharpshooter who defies gender and religious constraints to graduate from West Point, are first brought together by Stone, a lapsed Jew and an Army captain, amidst war and famine in East Africa. Their ensuing journey—which takes them from the mean streets of Mogadishu to the high desert of West Texas, from the barren plains of Indian country to the rolling hills of Minnesota—is at turns tragic and uplifting. Charlie’s son, Amir, is the bookmark in their lives, and the struggle to raise him amid the predators of white supremacy and violent radicalism is their life’s work. With the help of Buck, the bomb-sniffing dog with a nose for danger, they prevail over Somali militias, pirates, white supremacists, and ISIS terrorists in a splintering world that has turned on itself like a serpent in the singularly obscene act of devouring its own tail. A sweeping novel that digs deep into the backstories of some of the beloved West Texas characters from Seventh Flag, Balman’s award-winning debut novel, Murmuration is a mesmerizing story of what it means to be American in the twenty-first century.

Download or read book The House on Fripp Island written by Rebecca Kauffman and published by Ecco. This book was released on 2020 with total page 341 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A taut, page-turning novel of secrets and strife. When two families--one rich, one not--vacation together off the coast of South Carolina, little do they know that someone won't be returning home. Fripp Island, South Carolina is the perfect destination for the wealthy Daly family: Lisa, Scott, and their two girls. For Lisa's childhood friend, Poppy Ford, the resort island is a world away from the one she and Lisa grew up in--and when Lisa invites Poppy's family to join them, how can a working-class woman turn down an all-expenses paid vacation for her husband and children? But everyone brings secrets to the island, distorting what should be a convivial, relaxing summer on the beach. Lisa sees danger everywhere--the local handyman can't be allowed near the children, and Lisa suspects Scott is fixated on something, or someone, else. Poppy watches over her husband John and his routines with a sharp eye. It's a summer of change for all of the children: Ryan Ford who prepares for college in the fall, Rae Daly who seethes on the brink of adulthood, and the two youngest, Kimmy Daly and Alex Ford, who are exposed to new ideas and different ways of life as they forge a friendship of their own. Those who return from this vacation will spend the rest of their lives trying to process what they witnessed, the tipping points, moments of violence and tenderness, and the memory of whom they left behind.

Download or read book Valley of the Turtle Shirt Men written by Jack Lindquist and published by FriesenPress. This book was released on 2022-12-01 with total page 367 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Former Texas Ranger Jesse Rivers is on his way to California to seek his fortune in the burgeoning gold rush when a chance meeting with siblings Betsy and Shea O’Brian puts him on course to find a completely different kind of treasure—a fabled hoard of Spanish gold said to be lost in a place called the Valley of the Turtle Shirt Men. Although Jesse is skeptical of the gold’s existence, he agrees to the mission, if only to protect his naïve new friends, who are clearly in way over their heads. Having to cross into hostile Indian territory to reach the valley—and with a gang of outlaws waiting to ambush them if by some slim chance they manage to return home-- the quest will call upon every skill that Jesse gained as a Ranger and as an adopted captive raised by the Comanche. Even so, the price of the treasure may be nothing less than their lives.

Download or read book Lake Life written by David James Poissant and published by Simon & Schuster. This book was released on 2020-07-07 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the award-winning author of the acclaimed story collection The Heaven of Animals, called “a wise debut…beautiful [stories] with a rogue touch” (The New York Times Book Review), comes a sweeping, domestic novel about a family that reunites at their North Carolina lake house for one last vacation before the home is sold—and the long-buried secrets that are finally revealed. The Starling family is scattered across the country. Parents Richard and Lisa live in Ithaca, New York, and work at Cornell University. Their son Michael, a salesperson, lives in Dallas with his elementary school teacher wife, Diane. Michael’s brother, Thad, an aspiring poet, makes his home in New York City with his famous painter boyfriend, Jake. For years they’ve traveled to North Carolina to share a summer vacation at the family lake house. That tradition is coming to an end, as Richard and Lisa have decided to sell the treasured summer home and retire to Florida. Before they do, the family will spend one last weekend at the lake. But what should to be a joyous farewell takes a nightmarish turn when the family witnesses a tragedy that triggers a series of dramatic revelations among the Starlings—alcoholism, infidelity, pregnancy, and a secret the parents have kept from their sons for over thirty years. As the weekend unfolds, relationships fray, bonds are tested, and the Starlings are forced to reckon with who they are and what they want from this life. Set in today’s America, Lake Life is a beautifully rendered, emotionally compelling novel in the tradition of Jonathan Franzen’s The Corrections, Elizabeth Strout’s Olive Kitteridge, and Ann Patchett’s Commonwealth.

Download or read book Friend written by Paek Nam-nyong and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2020-05-05 with total page 179 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Paek Nam-nyong’s Friend is a tale of marital intrigue, abuse, and divorce in North Korea. A woman in her thirties comes to a courthouse petitioning for a divorce. As the judge who hears her statement begins to investigate the case, the story unfolds into a broader consideration of love and marriage. The novel delves into its protagonists’ past, describing how the couple first fell in love and then how their marriage deteriorated over the years. It chronicles the toll their acrimony takes on their son and their careers alongside the story of the judge’s own marital troubles. A best-seller in North Korea, where Paek continues to live and write, Friend illuminates a side of life in the DPRK that Western readers have never before encountered. Far from being a propagandistic screed in praise of the Great Leader, Friend describes the lives of people who struggle with everyday problems such as marital woes and workplace conflicts. Instead of socialist-realist stock figures, Paek depicts complex characters who wrestle with universal questions of individual identity, the split between public and private selves, the unpredictability of existence, and the never-ending labor of maintaining a relationship. This groundbreaking translation of one of North Korea’s most popular writers offers English-language readers a page-turner full of psychological tension as well as a revealing portrait of a society that is typically seen as closed to the outside world.

Download or read book Lemon written by Kwon Yeo-sun and published by Other Press, LLC. This book was released on 2021-10-26 with total page 176 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: New York Times Book Review: Editor’s Choice Philadelphia Inquirer: Best Book of the Month World Literature Today: Notable Translation of the Year CrimeReads: Best International Crime Novel of the Year Ms. Magazine: Most Anticipated Book of the Year Washington Independent Review of Books: Favorite Book of the Year Parasite meets The Good Son in this piercing psychological portrait of three women haunted by a brutal, unsolved crime. In the summer of 2002, when Korea is abuzz over hosting the FIFA World Cup, eighteen-year-old Kim Hae-on is killed in what becomes known as the High School Beauty Murder. Two suspects quickly emerge: rich kid Shin Jeongjun, whose car Hae-on was last seen in, and delivery boy Han Manu, who witnessed her there just a few hours before her death. But when Jeongjun’s alibi checks out, and no evidence can be pinned on Manu, the case goes cold. Seventeen years pass without any resolution for those close to Hae-on, and the grief and uncertainty take a cruel toll on her younger sister, Da-on, in particular. Unable to move on with her life, Da-on tries in her own twisted way to recover some of what she’s lost, ultimately setting out to find the truth of what happened. Shifting between the perspectives of Da-on and two of Hae-on’s classmates struck in different ways by her otherworldly beauty, Lemon ostensibly takes the shape of a crime novel. But identifying the perpetrator is not the main objective here: Kwon Yeo-sun uses this well-worn form to craft a searing, timely exploration of privilege, jealousy, trauma, and how we live with the wrongs we have endured and inflicted in turn.

Download or read book Morningside Heights written by Joshua Henkin and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2022-05-24 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice Book • When Ohio-born Pru Steiner arrives in New York in 1976, she follows in a long tradition of young people determined to take the city by storm. But when she falls in love with and marries Spence Robin, her hotshot young Shakespeare professor, her life takes a turn she couldn’t have anticipated. Thirty years later, something is wrong with Spence. The Great Man can’t concentrate; he falls asleep reading The New York Review of Books. With their daughter, Sarah, away at medical school, Pru must struggle on her own to care for him. One day, feeling especially isolated, Pru meets a man, and the possibility of new romance blooms. Meanwhile, Spence’s estranged son from his first marriage has come back into their lives. Arlo, a wealthy entrepreneur who invests in biotech, may be his father’s last, best hope. Morningside Heights is a sweeping and compassionate novel about a marriage surviving hardship. It’s about the love between women and men, and children and parents; about the things we give up in the face of adversity; and about how to survive when life turns out differently from what we thought we signed up for.

Download or read book Untold Night and Day written by Bae Suah and published by Abrams. This book was released on 2020-05-05 with total page 153 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The acclaimed Korean author weaves a “disturbing, beautifully controlled” metaphysical detective story “of doubles, shadows, and parallel worlds” (Financial Times). It’s Ayami’s final day working the box-office at Seoul’s only audio theater for the blind. Her last shift completed, she walks the streets with her former boss, searching for a missing friend. Their conversations take in art, love, food, and the inaccessible country to the north. The next day, Ayami acts as a guide for a detective novelist visiting from abroad. But as they contend with the summer heat, the edges of reality start to fray. Ayami enters a world of increasingly tangled threads, and the past intrudes upon the present as overlapping realities repeat, collide, change, and reassert themselves. Blisteringly original, Untold Night and Day upends the very structure of narrative storytelling. By one of the boldest and most innovative voices in contemporary Korean literature, and masterfully realized in English by Man Booker International Prize–winning translator Deborah Smith, Bae Suah’s hypnotic novel asks whether more than one version of ourselves can exist at once.

Download or read book Oliver s Travels written by Clifford Garstang and published by Regal House Publishing. This book was released on 2021-05-18 with total page 300 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ollie Tucker, a recent college graduate and student of philosophy, is obsessed with truth and the source of knowledge, questioning the validity of everything he hears from his parents, his girlfriend, and even the voices inside his head. In pursuit of the truth and life's deeper meaning, he invents an alter ego, Oliver, who lives the adventurous and exotic existence Ollie cannot. But Ollie has another problem--a repressed memory of his uncle Scotty that threatens to derail his life, his relationships, and his sexuality. But the memory is a blur. And what he thinks he remembers, he knows is unreliable. The uncertainty is paralyzing. What is the truth? What has his subconscious fabricated? When he learns that his uncle, long-presumed dead, is in fact alive and well, Ollie realizes that to move on with his life and find peace, he must confront his uncle.

Download or read book The Popol Vuh written by Lewis Spence and published by New York : AMS Press. This book was released on 1908 with total page 80 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: