“Pioneer” — as a noun is defined as “a person who is among the first to explore or settle a new country or area.” As a verb, it means “develop or be the first to use or apply (a new method, area of knowledge, or activity).” This anthology gives the reader the experience of the explorers who went to foreign lands to discover and learn about a specific field of knowledge and skills:the Asian martial arts.The eight chapters included here share a common root in the pio...

**“If there’s a more original novel published this year, I’ll be amazed.”—Suzi Feay, Financial TimesA polyphonic debut following an aging French bulldog and the parasitic worms that send her toward death — a singular, sly novel about form, freedom, interiors, and the matter by which we are composed and consumed.**Gelsomina is a French Bulldog who leads a routine life in a glass house. One day, she ingests an orb of parasitic worms who make an imperfect home inside ...

Who is Gelsomina to remark on love? Much of life has never happened for her. Gelsomina lives inside a house made of glass. Its cold, clear form separates her from the world beyond, and her architect owners dictate the monotonous structure of her days. She yearns for something, but she does not know what. Two creatures live inside Gelsomina, her warm flesh a vessel that contains them. They grow stronger while she begins to fade. As time passes, the lovable French bulldog and the parasites s...

In Schools of Fiction, Morgan Day Frank considers a bizarre but integral feature of the modern educational experience: that teachers enthusiastically teach literary works that have terrible things to say about school. From Ishmael's insistence in Herman Melville's Moby-Dick that "a whale-ship was my Yale College and my Harvard," to the unnamed narrator's expulsion from his southern college in Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man, the most frequently taught books in the ...

**“If there’s a more original novel published this year, I’ll be amazed.”—Suzi Feay, Financial Times"A strange, moving novel . . . The Oldest Bitch Alive made me think about animals and their brief, dim lives in a completely new way."—Laura Hackett, The Times (UK)“Captivating . . . A work of quiet and yet spirited exhilaration.” —Edward P. Jones, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Known World"An uncommonly commanding debut."...