Bowlaway

Bowlaway PDF Author: Elizabeth McCracken
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0062862871
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 374

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Book Description
A sweeping and enchanting new novel from the widely beloved, award-winning author Elizabeth McCracken about three generations of an unconventional New England family who own and operate a candlepin bowling alley From the day she is discovered unconscious in a New England cemetery at the turn of the twentieth century—nothing but a bowling ball, a candlepin, and fifteen pounds of gold on her person—Bertha Truitt is an enigma to everyone in Salford, Massachusetts. She has no past to speak of, or at least none she is willing to reveal, and her mysterious origin scandalizes and intrigues the townspeople, as does her choice to marry and start a family with Leviticus Sprague, the doctor who revived her. But Bertha is plucky, tenacious, and entrepreneurial, and the bowling alley she opens quickly becomes Salford’s most defining landmark—with Bertha its most notable resident. When Bertha dies in a freak accident, her past resurfaces in the form of a heretofore-unheard-of son, who arrives in Salford claiming he is heir apparent to Truitt Alleys. Soon it becomes clear that, even in her death, Bertha’s defining spirit and the implications of her obfuscations live on, infecting and affecting future generations through inheritance battles, murky paternities, and hidden wills. In a voice laced with insight and her signature sharp humor, Elizabeth McCracken has written an epic family saga set against the backdrop of twentieth-century America. Bowlaway is both a stunning feat of language and a brilliant unraveling of a family’s myths and secrets, its passions and betrayals, and the ties that bind and the rifts that divide.

Bowlaway

Bowlaway PDF Author: Elizabeth McCracken
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0062862871
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 374

Get Book Here

Book Description
A sweeping and enchanting new novel from the widely beloved, award-winning author Elizabeth McCracken about three generations of an unconventional New England family who own and operate a candlepin bowling alley From the day she is discovered unconscious in a New England cemetery at the turn of the twentieth century—nothing but a bowling ball, a candlepin, and fifteen pounds of gold on her person—Bertha Truitt is an enigma to everyone in Salford, Massachusetts. She has no past to speak of, or at least none she is willing to reveal, and her mysterious origin scandalizes and intrigues the townspeople, as does her choice to marry and start a family with Leviticus Sprague, the doctor who revived her. But Bertha is plucky, tenacious, and entrepreneurial, and the bowling alley she opens quickly becomes Salford’s most defining landmark—with Bertha its most notable resident. When Bertha dies in a freak accident, her past resurfaces in the form of a heretofore-unheard-of son, who arrives in Salford claiming he is heir apparent to Truitt Alleys. Soon it becomes clear that, even in her death, Bertha’s defining spirit and the implications of her obfuscations live on, infecting and affecting future generations through inheritance battles, murky paternities, and hidden wills. In a voice laced with insight and her signature sharp humor, Elizabeth McCracken has written an epic family saga set against the backdrop of twentieth-century America. Bowlaway is both a stunning feat of language and a brilliant unraveling of a family’s myths and secrets, its passions and betrayals, and the ties that bind and the rifts that divide.

The Giant's House

The Giant's House PDF Author: Elizabeth McCracken
Publisher: Dial Press
ISBN: 0307833488
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 274

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Book Description
“McCracken mixes the proper amount of lunacy with exactly the right amount of sorrow. The blend is reminiscent of such late-20th-century treasures as The Accidental Tourist, The World According to Garp, or A Confederacy of Dunces.”—Denver Post The year is 1950, and in a small town on Cape Cod twenty-six-year-old librarian Peggy Cort feels like love and life have stood her up. Until the day James Carlson Sweatt– the “over-tall” eleven-year-old boy who’s the talk of the town–walks into her library and changes her life forever. Two misfits whose lonely paths cross at the circulation desk, Peggy and James are odd candidates for friendship, but nevertheless they soon find their lives entwined in ways that neither one could have predicted. In James, Peggy discovers the one person who’s ever really understood her, and as he grows– six foot five at age twelve, then seven feet, then eight–so does her heart and their most singular romance. Praise for The Giant's House “Remarkable . . . McCracken has wit and subtlety to burn, as well as an uncanny ability to tap into the sadness that runs through the center of her characters’ worlds. This book is so lovely that, when you’re reading, you’ll want to sleep with it under your pillow.”—Salon A true marvel . . . thoroughly enjoyable from its unlikely beginning to its bittersweet end. . . McCracken knows all kinds of subtle, enticing secrets of the heart and conveys them in silky, transparent language.”—San Francisco Chronicle “Lovely . . . a tribute to the quiet passion of people trapped in isolation.”—Los Angeles Times “Fascinating . . . The reader finds herself entangled, body and soul, in this tender and endlessly strange novel, which is in all senses a hymn to human growth gone haywire and to a love so big it can’t hold its own magnificent limbs upright.”—Elle “Such is the incantatory power of McCracken’s eccentric tale that by its close we are completely in the grip of its strangely conceived ardor. . . . McCracken is as original a writer as they come. . . . I fell in love.”—Daphne Merkin, The New Yorker

Niagara Falls All Over Again

Niagara Falls All Over Again PDF Author: Elizabeth McCracken
Publisher: Delta
ISBN: 0440333911
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 336

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Book Description
By turns graceful and knowing, funny and moving, Niagara Falls All Over Again is the latest masterwork by National Book Award finalist and author of The Giant’s House, Elizabeth McCracken. Spanning the waning years of vaudeville and the golden age of Hollywood, Niagara Falls All Over Again chronicles a flawed, passionate friendship over thirty years, weaving a powerful story of family and love, grief and loss. In it, McCracken introduces her most singular and affecting hero: Mose Sharp — son, brother, husband, father, friend ... and straight man to the fat guy in baggy pants who utterly transforms his life. To the paying public, Mose Sharp was the arch, colorless half of the comedy team Carter and Sharp. To his partner, he was charmed and charming, a confirmed bachelor who never failed at love and romance. To his father and sisters, Mose was a prodigal son. And in his own heart and soul, he would always be a boy who once had a chance to save a girl’s life — a girl who would be his first, and greatest, loss. Born into a Jewish family in small-town Iowa, the only boy among six sisters, Mose Sharp couldn’t leave home soon enough. By sixteen Mose had already joined the vaudeville circuit. But he knew one thing from the start: “I needed a partner,” he recalls. “I had always needed a partner.” Then, an ebullient, self-destructive comedian named Rocky Carter came crashing into his life — and a thirty-year partnership was born. But as the comedy team of Carter and Sharp thrived from the vaudeville backwaters to Broadway to Hollywood, a funny thing happened amid the laughter: It was Mose who had all the best lines offstage. Rocky would go through money, women, and wives in his restless search for love; Mose would settle down to a family life marked by fragile joy and wrenching tragedy. And soon, cracks were appearing in their complex relationship ... until one unforgivable act leads to another and a partnership begins to unravel. In a novel as daring as it is compassionate, Elizabeth McCracken introduces an indelibly drawn cast of characters — from Mose’s Iowa family to the vagabond friends, lovers, and competitors who share his dizzying journey — as she deftly explores the fragile structures that underlie love affairs and friendships, partnerships and families. An elegiac and uniquely American novel, Niagara Falls All Over Again is storytelling at its finest — and powerful proof that Elizabeth McCracken is one of the most dynamic and wholly original voices of her generation.

Vacuum in the Dark

Vacuum in the Dark PDF Author: Jen Beagin
Publisher: Scribner
ISBN: 1501182153
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 256

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Book Description
From the Whiting Award–winning author of Pretend I’m Dead and one of the most exhilarating new voices in fiction, a “thoroughly delightfully, surprisingly profound” (Entertainment Weekly) one-of-a-kind novel about a cleaning lady named Mona and her struggles to move forward in life. Soon to be an FX television show starring Lola Kirke. Mona is twenty-six and cleans houses for a living in Taos, New Mexico. She moved there mostly because of a bad boyfriend—a junkie named Mr. Disgusting, long story—and her efforts to restart her life since haven’t exactly gone as planned. For one thing, she’s got another bad boyfriend. This one she calls Dark, and he happens to be married to one of Mona’s clients. He also might be a little unstable. Dark and his wife aren’t the only complicated clients on Mona’s roster, either. There’s also the Hungarian artist couple who—with her addiction to painkillers and his lingering stares—reminds Mona of troubling aspects of her childhood, and some of the underlying reasons her life had to be restarted in the first place. As she tries to get over the heartache of her affair and the older pains of her youth, Mona winds up on an eccentric, moving journey of self-discovery that takes her back to her beginnings where she attempts to unlock the key to having a sense of home in the future. The only problems are Dark and her past. Neither is so easy to get rid of. Jen Beagin’s Vacuum in the Dark is an unforgettable, astonishing read, “by turns nutty and forlorn…Brash, deadpan, and achingly troubled” (O, The Oprah Magazine). Beagin is “a wonderfully funny writer who also happens to tackle serious subjects” (NPR).

The Souvenir Museum

The Souvenir Museum PDF Author: Elizabeth McCracken
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 9781529115086
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
'One of my favourite writers' Nick Hornby One of the most acclaimed writers of our day, award-winning author Elizabeth McCracken is an undisputed virtuoso of the short story, and this new collection features her most vibrant and heartrending work to date. A recent widower and his adult son ferry to a craggy Scottish island in search of puffins. An actress who plays a children's game-show villainess ushers in the New Year with her deadbeat half-brother. And on a trip to a water park with their son, two fathers each confront a deep-rooted personal fear. With sentences that crackle and spark and showcase her trademark wit, McCracken shows how the mysterious bonds of family are tested, transformed, fractured, and fortified. 'McCracken has a gift for spotting the comic potential in situations many of us have endured... Her prose is stippled with just-so observations' Observer 'McCracken is a totally assured performer- even seemingly throwaway perceptions are often memorably poetic, and there is a hint of melancholy under the comedy' Sunday Times 'This incisive, warm-blooded collection of stories is populated by outsiders... McCracken illuminates qualities of human nature through fragments of her characters' lives' New Yorker

Animal Wife

Animal Wife PDF Author: Lara Ehrlich
Publisher: Red Hen Press
ISBN: 1597098833
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 137

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Book Description
In this award-winning debut collection, fifteen magical realism stories portray girls and women searching for an escape from their everyday lives. “In villages where women bore most of the weight of a constricted life, witches flew by night on broomsticks,” said Italo Calvino of the way imagination bridges the gap between everyday existence and an idealized alternative . . . The fifteen stories of Animal Wife are unified by girls and women who cross this threshold seeking liberation from family responsibilities, from societal expectations, from their own minds. A girl born with feathers undertakes a quest for the mother who abandoned her. An indecisive woman drinks Foresight, only to become stymied by the futures branching before her. A proofreader cultivates a cage-fighting alter ego. A woman becomes psychologically trapped in her car. A girl acts on her desire for a childhood friend as a monster draws closer to the shore. A widow invites a bear to hibernate in her den . . . Animal Wife was selected as the winner of the Red Hen Fiction Award by New York Times– bestselling author Ann Hood, who says, “From the first sentence Animal Wife grabbed me and never let go. Sensual and intelligent, with gorgeous prose, it made me dizzy with its exploration and illumination of the inner and outer lives of girls and women.” Praise for Animal Wife “Whimsy and fantasy meet the way things really turn out in stories from a strong new voice.” —Kirkus Reviews “Strange, funny, fearsome, Animal Wife is a gorgeous book, weird in its very bones.” —Elizabeth McCracken, author of Bowlaway: A Novel “Lara Ehrlich has written a collection of stories that allow for escapism.” —F(r)iction “I was particularly intrigued by the way Lara beautifully portrays the inner struggle between wildness and domesticity, the surreal elements of each story lending a mythical complexity to these conflicts. Really lovely and thought-provoking. Perfect for fans of Aimee Bender, Karen Russell, and Angela Carter.” —Joy Baglio, founder of Pioneer Valley Writer’s Workshop

Everything Is Under Control

Everything Is Under Control PDF Author: Phyllis Grant
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
ISBN: 0374720754
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 174

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Book Description
“A fast-paced, heart-smacking memoir” detailing one woman’s life journey as a dancer, pastry chef, and mother (Bon Appétit). One of Esquire’s Best Cookbooks of 2020 and Washington Post’s Best Food Books of 2020 “What a beautiful, rich, and poetic memoir this is. . . . Like the best chefs, Phyllis Grant knows how to make a masterpiece from a few simple ingredients: truth, taste, poignancy, and love.” —Elizabeth Gilbert, author of City of Girls and Eat, Pray, Love Phyllis Grant’s Everything Is Under Control is a story about appetite—as it comes, goes, and refocuses its object of desire. Grant’s revealing memoir follows the sometimes smooth, sometimes jagged, always revealing contours of her life: from her days as a dancer struggling to find her place at Julliard, to her experiences in and out of four-star kitchens in New York City, to falling in love with her future husband and leaving the city after 9/11 for California, where her children are born. All the while, a sense of longing pulses in each stage as she moves through the headspace of a young woman yearning to be sustained by a city into that of a mother now sustaining a family herself. Written with the transparency of a diarist, Everything Is Under Control is an unputdownable series of vignettes followed by tried-and-true recipes from Grant’s table—a heartrending yet unsentimental portrait of the highs and lows of young adulthood, motherhood, and a life in the kitchen. “A truly distinct perspective. . . . [A] damn fine writer. . . . Distinguished by her keen attention to the sublime detail and a voice as eviscerating as it is lyrical. . . . Transcendent.” —The New York Times Book Review “Phyllis Grant has the voice of a poet and the sensuality of a cook. This very brave book makes you want to experience the world with equal intensity. As for the recipes . . . completely irresistible.” —Ruth Reichl, author of Save Me the Plums

Leaving Isn't the Hardest Thing

Leaving Isn't the Hardest Thing PDF Author: Lauren Hough
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0593080777
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 322

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Book Description
A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • "A memoir in essays about so many things—growing up in an abusive cult, coming of age as a lesbian in the military, forced out by homophobia, living on the margins as a working class woman and what it’s like to grow into the person you are meant to be. Hough’s writing will break your heart." —Roxane Gay, author of Bad Feminist Searing and extremely personal essays, shot through with the darkest elements America can manifest, while discovering light and humor in unexpected corners. As an adult, Lauren Hough has had many identities: an airman in the U.S. Air Force, a cable guy, a bouncer at a gay club. As a child, however, she had none. Growing up as a member of the infamous cult The Children of God, Hough had her own self robbed from her. The cult took her all over the globe--to Germany, Japan, Texas, Chile—but it wasn't until she finally left for good that Lauren understood she could have a life beyond "The Family." Along the way, she's loaded up her car and started over, trading one life for the next. She's taken pilgrimages to the sights of her youth, been kept in solitary confinement, dated a lot of women, dabbled in drugs, and eventually found herself as what she always wanted to be: a writer. Here, as she sweeps through the underbelly of America—relying on friends, family, and strangers alike—she begins to excavate a new identity even as her past continues to trail her and color her world, relationships, and perceptions of self. At once razor-sharp, profoundly brave, and often very, very funny, the essays in Leaving Isn't the Hardest Thing interrogate our notions of ecstasy, queerness, and what it means to live freely. Each piece is a reckoning: of survival, identity, and how to reclaim one's past when carving out a future. A VINTAGE ORIGINAL

Lunch with Tommy and Stasia

Lunch with Tommy and Stasia PDF Author: Mike Morin
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781939449184
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
"Hold on to your tray tables, boys and girls!" This was the Saturday lunchtime rally cry from legendary Channel 5 sportscaster Don Gillis. Every week for nearly four decades, families slurped tomato soup and crunched on grilled cheese sandwiches while the world's best candlepin bowlers performed otherworldly feats for over 200,000 TV viewers. Candlepin Bowling, often the top-rated Boston sports show of the week, made names like Czernicki, Olszta, and Jutras as familiar as Bird, Yastrzemski and Orr. Mike Morin's new book, Lunch With Tommy and Stasia: TV's Golden Age of Candlepin Bowling, is the very first behind-the-scenes look at what made these pop-up stars tick. Morin watched hundreds of hours of classic TV matches and then sought out the bowlers to uncover what really happened on (and off) the lanes.As a TV co-host of nearly 300 candlepin bowling episodes in Boston and New Hampshire, Morin got to know the players personally. They didn't hold back as they shared their stories, many never heard before. Stories like:Mike Sargent wins a big-money purse match but instead gets paid with something he never expected.Tom Olszta's discarded, muddy bowling balls make a surprise appearance courtesy of Santa.Hollywood celebrities love candlepins. Just ask Eve "Jan Brady" Plumb, Will Ferrell, and Simpson's executive producer Matt Selman.The highs and lows are all laid out, accompanied by a photo gallery that will bring back memories of Saturday lunches with Tommy, Stasia, and hundreds of other candlepin bowling stars. Finally, their stories are told.

Thunderstruck & Other Stories

Thunderstruck & Other Stories PDF Author: Elizabeth McCracken
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 1448191440
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 196

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Book Description
From the author of the beloved novel The Giant's House - finalist for the National Book Award - comes a beautiful new story collection, her first in twenty years. Laced through with humour, empathy, and rare and magical descriptive powers these nine vibrant stories navigate the fragile space between love and loneliness. In 'Property', a young scholar, grieving the sudden death of his wife, decides to refurbish the Maine rental house they were to share together by removing his landlord's possessions. In 'Peter Elroy: A Documentary by Ian Casey', the household of a successful filmmaker is visited years later by his famous first subject, whose trust he betrayed. And in the unforgettable title story, a family makes a quixotic decision to flee to Paris for a summer, only to find their lives altered in an unimaginable way by their teenage daughter's risky behaviour. In Elizabeth McCracken's universe, heartache is always interwoven with strange, charmed moments of joy - an unexpected conversation with small children, the gift of a parrot with a bad French accent - that remind us of the wonder and mystery of being alive. Thunderstruck & Other Stories shows this inimitable writer working at the full height of her powers.