In the middle of a perilous drought in the Northwest, an arsonist begins setting fires all around. It gives Zoe Penney nightmares about her home—seated right next to tinder-dry woods—rising up in explosions of fire, as well as haunting dreams of a little boy deep in the forest.Winter brings the longed-for rains but also a cancer diagnosis for Zoe’s husband, Jay, which plunges the family into disbelief and fear. The children lean in close to their parents, can’t stop touching them. ...

Female scholars reevaluate gender and the female presence in the life and work of one of America’s foremost writersErnest Hemingway has often been criticized as a misogynist because of his portrayal of women. But some of the most exciting Hemingway scholarship of recent years has come from women scholars who challenge traditional views of Hemingway and women. The essays in this collection range from discussions of Hemingway’s famous heroines Brett Ashley a...

Full Moon at Noontide is the story of Ann Putnam’s mother and father and her father’s identical twin, and how they lived together with their courage and their stumblings, as they made their way into old age and then into death. It’s the story of the journey from one twin’s death to the other, of what happened along the way, of what it means to lose the other who is also oneself. And it’s the story of how Ann Putnam herself struggled to save them and could not, and how she dealt wi...

'A compelling memoir. Absorbing and graced with a deceptive lightness of touch, [Hanging with the Elephant] is clever and brilliantly pieced together. Harding writes like an angel' Sunday TimesFrom the No.1 bestselling author of Staring at Lakes, Talking to S**trangers and On Tuesdays I'm A Buddhist**'In public or on stage, it's different. I'm fine. I have no bother talking to three hundred peopl...

Modern American poets writing in the face of deathIn Last Looks, Last Books, the eminent critic Helen Vendler examines the ways in which five great modern American poets, writing their final books, try to find a style that does justice to life and death alike. With traditional religious consolations no longer available to them, these poets must invent new ways to express the crisis of death, as well as the paradoxical coexistence of a declining body and an...

The remarkable story of one woman's journey from grief to faith to happiness—as she holds her family together in the wake of her husband's death, pursues his dream of becoming a minister, and ultimately finds her calling as a chaplain to search-and-rescue workers.Ten years ago, Kate Braestrup and her husband Drew were enjoying the life they shared together. They had four young children, and Drew, a Maine state trooper, would soon begin training to become a minister...

The Size of Thoughts, a collection of essays that have appeared in the New Yorker and other publications, includes one never-before-published piece on the world of electronics. The essays celebrate the joy--and exquisite details--of everything from library card catalogs and reading aloud to the significance of wine stains on a tablecloth.Baker turns any subject, from feeding a child to phone sex, into literature with a style that is sparklingly original, frequently...

We all expect our parents to precede us in death. No one expects to have to make their child's funeral arrangements. And the loss of a child brings with it a special and persistent manifestation of grief that can feel "like a stomachache that never ends."Gone but Not Lost is a thoughtful gift for a family that has experienced the death of a child. Each of its brief chapters covers one element of grieving, bringing readers through sorrow and helping them deal with feelings ...

An extraordinary, path-breaking, and penetrating book on the life and work and creative inspirations of the great children's book genius Maurice Sendak, who since his death in 2012 has only grown in his stature and recognition as a major American artist, period.Polymath and master interviewer Jonathan Cott first interviewed Maurice Sendak in 1976 for Rolling Stone, just at the time when Outside Over There, the concluding and by far the strangest v...

Alongside Wallace Stevens, James Merrill, and other pillars of twentieth-century poetry, Anthony Hecht joins the Borzoi Poetry series.Hecht, whose writing rings with the cadences of the King James Bible, and who, as an infantryman at the end of World War II, participated in the liberation of the concentration camps, lived and experienced the best and worst of the twentieth century. Readers of this volume—the first selected poems to be made from Hecht’s seven individual volumes—will...

'E****xtraordinary. I've never met anyone who has read it and doesn't rank it as one of their favourite books.' DOLLY ALDERTON**'**So fierce and brave and visceral and raw - will stay with me forever. I loved it.' ELIZABETH GILBERT'F****ull of heart, bravery and adventure.' AMY LIPTROTSHORTLISTED FOR THE WAINWRIGHT PRIZEClover Stroud grew up in rural Wiltshi...

Travel writing has always been intimately linked with the construction of American identity. Occupying the space between fact and fiction, it exposes cultural fault lines and reveals the changing desires and anxieties of both the traveller and the reading public. These specially-commissioned essays trace the journeys taken by writers from the pre-revolutionary period right up to the present. They examine a wide range of responses to the problems posed by landscapes found both at home and a...