Scablands and Other Stories

Jonathan Taylor

Casa editrice: Salt

Sinossi

Winner of the 2025 Arnold Bennett Book Prize
These are tales from the post-industrial scablands – stories of austerity, poverty, masochism and migration. The people here are sick, lonely, lost, half-living in the aftermath of upheaval or trauma. A teacher obsessively canes himself. A neurologist forgets where home is. A starving woman sells hugs in an abandoned kiosk.
Yet sometimes, even in the twilit scablands, there's also beauty, music, laughter. Sometimes a town square is filled with bubbles. Sometimes sisters dream they can fly. Sometimes an old man plays Bach to an empty street, two ailing actors see animal shapes in clouds, a cancer survivor searches for a winning lottery ticket in her rundown flat. And sometimes Gustav Mahler lives just round the corner, hoarding rare records in a Stoke terrace.

Disponibile da: 15/07/2023.

Lunghezza di stampa: 224 pagine.

Altri libri che potrebbero interessarti

Nightingale

Tobias Wolff

Dr. Booth drives his son, Owen, to Fort Steele Academy, where he hopes his son will thrive in a structured, disciplined environment that mirrors Booth’s own upbringing. But after he drops Owen off at his new school, he’s filled with a deep sense of doubt—about his decision to send his son away, about his childhood—and finds himself lost in more ways than one.

Mostra libro

O Henry Memorial Award Prize...

Various Various

In 1918 the Society of Arts and Sciences established the O. Henry Memorial Awards to reward the very best short stories published during the previous year with cash prizes.   1921 was a particularly productive year with sterling and brilliantly varied examples of the art of short story writing as are included here.  The selection committee struggled to agree on these, but finally, here they are for us to enjoy and record.   The length varies but most are sufficiently long for a reader to get their teeth into and enjoy.   The stories are listed in a rough order of how they were judged, but all are excellent.     - Summary by Phil Chenevert

Mostra libro

Dies Irae - From their pens to...

Kenneth Grahame

Kenneth Grahame was born on 8th March 1859 in Edinburgh.
At age 5 his mother succumbed to puerperal fever. His father, who had a drinking problem, now sent his 4 children to live with their grandmother at her large house in Cookham, Berkshire. Here the children lived in large open grounds next to the river. These early experiences would in later years, be retold in his writing through a myriad of characters.
Grahame loved being a pupil at St Edward's School, Oxford and wanted to enroll at the university there but his guardian demurred on account of the cost.
Instead, a banking career was chosen for him, starting in 1879 at the Bank of England, where he rose steadily to the rank of its Secretary until retiring, with a pension, in 1908 due to ill health.
Alongside his commercial career Grahame had written and published various stories and essays in several periodicals. Some were anthologized as ‘Pagan Papers’ in 1893, and two years later ‘The Golden Age’ and later still ‘Dream Days’ and its masterpiece ‘The Reluctant Dragon’ became part of many home libraries. His ability to view life through the lens of a young and curious child was superb, enabling the reader to easily identify with the character.
Grahame married Elspeth Thomson in 1899 and they had one child; Alastair, born semi-blind and plagued by health problems. In a heart-rending tragedy he would later take his own life whilst attending Oxford University in 1920.
In 1908 Grahame reworked many of the bedtime stories he had fashioned for his son into the enduring favourite; ‘The Wind in the Willows’, describing the heart-warming adventures of Mr Toad and his friends.
Kenneth Grahame died in Pangbourne, Berkshire, on 6th July 1932.

Mostra libro

Joseph - A Story - From their...

Katherine Rickford

The bookshelves of American literature are incredible collections that have gathered together centuries of very talented authors.  From this continent their fame spread and whilst among their number many are now forgotten or neglected their talents endure.  Among them is Katherine Rickford.

Mostra libro

The Tragedy of a Comic Song -...

Leonard Merrick

The bookshelves of British literature are incredible collections that have gathered together centuries of very talented authors.  From these Isles their fame spread and whilst among their number many are now forgotten or neglected their talents endure.  Among them is Walter Besant.

Mostra libro

Requiem For An Athlete

Alfred C. Martino

Requiem For An Athlete is a somber tale of the unfulfilled expectations of a once-great athlete, seeing through tear-clouded eyes the trophies and medals of a life long gone. 
 
Alfred C. Martino is the author of three highly-acclaimed young adult novels, "Perfected By Girls, "Over The End Line," and the Jr. Library Guild Selection and 'Best Books For Young Adults' nominee, "Pinned." Amateur wrestling and soccer have been a part of Alfred‘s life for over thirty-five years. In wrestling, he has competed on the midget, junior high, high school and collegiate levels, as well as coached Millburn’s youth program for nearly a decade. Mr. Martino was born and raised in Short Hills, NJ, and graduated from Millburn High School, where he was captain of school’s 1982 wrestling team. He is a graduate of Duke University and The Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California. He currently lives in Jersey City.

Mostra libro