In his introduction to the The Best American Noir of theCentury, James Ellroy writes, “noir is the most scrutinizedoffshoot of the hard-boiled school of fiction. It’s the long dropoff the short pier and the wrong man and the wrong woman in perfectmisalliance. It’s the nightmare of flawed souls with big dreams andthe precise how and why of the all-time sure thing that goes bad.”Offering the best examples of literary sure things gone bad, thiscollection ensures that nowhere else can readers find a darker,more thorough distillation of American noirfiction. James Ellroy and Otto Penzler, series editor of the annual TheBest American Mystery Stories, mined one hundred years ofwriting—1910–2010—to find this treasure trove of thirty-ninestories. From noir’s twenties-era infancy come gems like James M.Cain’s “Pastorale,” and its post-war heyday boasts giants likeMickey Spillane and Evan Hunter. Packing an undeniable punch,diverse contemporary incarnations include Elmore Leonard, Pa

Against the backdrop of the Korean War, a young man faceslife's unimagined chances and terrifying consequences. It is 1951in America, the second year of the Korean War. A studious,law-abiding, intense youngster from Newark, New Jersey, MarcusMessner, is beginning his sophomore year on the pastoral,conservative campus of Ohio's Winesburg College. And why is hethere and not at the local college in Newark where he originallyenrolled? Because his father, the sturdy, hard-working neighborhoodbutcher, seems to have gone mad -- mad with fear and apprehensionof the dangers of adult life, the dangers of the world, the dangershe sees in every corner for his beloved boy. As the long-suffering,desperately harassed mother tells her son, the father's fear arisesfrom love and pride. Perhaps, but it produces too much anger inMarcus for him to endure living with his parents any longer. Heleaves them and, far from Newark, in the midwestern college, has tofind his way amid the customs and constrictions of another America

An astonishing technique for recovering and cloning dinosaurDNA has been discovered. Creatures once extinct now roam JurassicPark, soon-to-be opened as a theme park. Until something goeswrong...and science proves a dangeroustoy...."Wonderful...Powerful."THE WASHINGTON POST BOOK WORLD "Fromthe Paperback edition."

Known as an ‘anthropologist of everyday life,’ Margaret Visserhas, in five award-winning books, uncovered and illuminated theintriguing and unexpected meanings of everyday objects and habits.Now she turns her keen eye to another custom so frequentlyencountered that it often escapes notice: saying ‘Thank you.’ Whatdo we really mean by these two simple words? This fascinating inquiry into all aspects of gratitude ranges fromthe unusual determination with which parents teach their childrento thank, to the difference between speaking the words and feelingthem, to the ways different cultures handle the complex matters ofgiving, receiving, and returning favors and presents. Visserilluminates the fundamental opposition in our own culture betweengift-giving and commodity exchange, and the similarities betweengratitude and its opposite, vengefulness. The Gift of Thanksconsiders cultural history, including the modern battle of socialscientists to pin down the notion of thankfulness and account forit, and the

It is 1998, the year in which America is whipped into a frenzyof prurience by the impeachment of a president, and in a small NewEngland town, an aging classics professor, Coleman Silk, is forcedto retire when his colleagues decree that he is a racist. Thecharge is a lie, but the real truth about Silk would haveastonished his most virulent accuser. Coleman Silk has a secret.But it's not the secret of his affair, at seventy-one, with FauniaFarley, a woman half his age with a savagely wrecked past - apart-time farmhand and a janitor at the college where, untilrecently, he was the powerful dean of faculty. And it's not thesecret of Coleman's alleged racism, which provoked the collegewitch-hunt that cost him his job and, to his mind, killed his wife.Nor is it the secret of misogyny, despite the best efforts of hisambitious young colleague, Professor Delphine Roux, to expose himas a fiend. Coleman's secret has been kept for fifty years: fromhis wife, his four children, his colleagues, and his friends,includi

In the "stifling heat of equatorial Newark," a terrifyingepidemic is raging, threatening the children of the New Jersey citywith maiming, paralysis, life-long disability, and even death. Thisis the startling and surprising theme of Roth's wrenching new book:a wartime polio epidemic in the summer of 1944 and the effect ithas on a closely knit, family-oriented Newark community and itschildren. At the center of NEMISIS is a vigorous, dutiful, twenty-threeyear old playground director, Bucky Cantor, a javelin thrower andweightlifter, who is devoted to his charges and disappointed withhimself because his weak eyes have excluded him from serving in thewar alongside his contemporaries. Focusing on Cantor's dilemmas aspolio begins to ravage his playground--and on the everday realitieshe faces--Roth leads us through every inch of emotion such apestilence can breed: the fear, the panic, the anger, thebewilderment, the suffering, and the pain. Moving between the smoldering, malodorous streets of besieg

It is the year 1327. Franciscans in an Italian abbey aresuspected of heresy, but Brother William of Baskerville'sinvestigation is suddenly overshadowed by seven bizarre deaths.Translated by William Weaver. A Helen and Kurt Wolff Book

Dubbed "the American Tolkien" by "Time" magazine, #1 "New YorkTimes" bestselling author George R.R. Martin is a giant in thefield of fantasy literature and one of the most excitingstorytellers of our time. Now he delivers a rare treat for readers:a compendium of his shorter works, collected into two stunningvolumes, that offer fascinating insight into his journey from youngwriter to award-winning master. Gathered here, in Volume I, are thevery best of George R.R. Martin's early works, includingnever-before-published fan pieces, his Hugo, Nebula, and BramStoker Award-winning stories--plus the original novella "The IceDragon, "from which Martin's "New York Times" bestsellingchildren's book of the same title originated. A dazzling array thatfeatures extensive author commentary, Dreamsongs, Volume I," " isthe perfect collection for both Martin devotees and a newgeneration of fans.

米歇尔·图尔尼埃(1924-)，法国当代文学大师，当代著名的新寓言派文学的主将。他不仅是才华横溢的小说家，而且是睿智深刻的哲学家。西方批评界对他的小说以及融汇在小说中的现代哲学思想推崇备至，评价极高，认为他以自己独特的风格为法国小说开创了新局面。《礼拜五或太平洋上的灵薄狱》是他的代表作之一，发表当年即获法兰西学院文学大奖。 《礼拜五或太平洋上的灵薄狱》是一篇“现代文明衰亡记”的寓言，它戏仿笛福的名著《鲁滨孙漂流记》的题材，在主题上却反其道而行之。鲁滨孙孤独一人被弃荒岛后，按西方文明社会的模式将荒岛治理得井井有条。礼拜五来到荒岛后，非但没有被驯化为鲁滨孙的奴隶，反而以其自然的天性将文明的迹象破坏得一干二净，同时也慢慢影响了鲁滨孙，使这个西方文明的代表逐步抛弃了原有的文化传统，变成了一个

Here for the first time, the original, complete Star Warstrilogy in a special 25th anniversary collector's editionhardcover.Twenty-five years after the phenomenon was born, StarWars remains one of the greatest fantasy epics ever told. Here inone collector's edition are the original stories from the firstthree classic films -- Star Wars: A New Hope, Star Wars: The EmpireStrikes Back, and Star Wars: Return of the Jedi -- each a New YorkTimes bestseller with over one million copies in print. Read thesethrilling novels to see where it all began with Luke Skywalker, afarm boy looking for adventure in a galaxy far, far away....

米歇尔·图尔尼埃(1924-)，法国当代文学大师，当代著名的新寓言派文学的主将。他不仅是才华横溢的小说家，而且是睿智深刻的哲学家。西方批评界对他的小说以及融汇在小说中的现代哲学思想推崇备至，评价极高，认为他以自己独特的风格为法国小说开创了新局面。《礼拜五或太平洋上的灵薄狱》是他的代表作之一，发表当年即获法兰西学院文学大奖。 《礼拜五或太平洋上的灵薄狱》是一篇“现代文明衰亡记”的寓言，它戏仿笛福的名著《鲁滨孙漂流记》的题材，在主题上却反其道而行之。鲁滨孙孤独一人被弃荒岛后，按西方文明社会的模式将荒岛治理得井井有条。礼拜五来到荒岛后，非但没有被驯化为鲁滨孙的奴隶，反而以其自然的天性将文明的迹象破坏得一干二净，同时也慢慢影响了鲁滨孙，使这个西方文明的代表逐步抛弃了原有的文化传统，变成了一个

Doc Ebersole lives with the ghost of Hank Williams—not just inthe figurative sense, not just because he was one of the lastpeople to see him alive, and not just because he is rumored to havegiven Hank the final morphine dose that killed him. In 1963, ten years after Hank's death, Doc himself is wracked byaddiction. Having lost his license to practice medicine, hismorphine habit isn't as easy to support as it used to be. So helives in a rented room in the red-light district on the south sideof San Antonio, performing abortions and patching up the odd knifeor gunshot wound. But when Graciela, a young Mexican immigrant,appears in the neighborhood in search of Doc's services, miraculousthings begin to happen. Graciela sustains a wound on her wrist thatnever heals, yet she heals others with the touch of her hand.Everyone she meets is transformed for the better, except, maybe,for Hank's angry ghost—who isn't at all pleased to see Doc doingwell. A brilliant excavation of an obscure piece of m

First published in 1938, The Hobbit is a story that "grew inthe telling," and many characters and events in the published bookare completely different from what Tolkien first wrote to readaloud to his young sons as part of their "fireside reads." For thefirst time, The History of the Hobbit reproduces the originalversion of one of literature's most famous stories, and includesmany little-known illustrations and previously unpublished maps forThe Hobbit created by Tolkien himself. Also featured are extensiveannotations and commentaries on the date of composition, howTolkien's professional and early mythological writings influencedthe story, the imaginary geography he created, and how he came torevise the book in the years after publication to accommodateevents in The Lord of the Rings.

米歇尔·图尔尼埃(1924-)，法国当代文学大师，当代著名的新寓言派文学的主将。他不仅是才华横溢的小说家，而且是睿智深刻的哲学家。西方批评界对他的小说以及融汇在小说中的现代哲学思想推崇备至，评价极高，认为他以自己独特的风格为法国小说开创了新局面。《礼拜五或太平洋上的灵薄狱》是他的代表作之一，发表当年即获法兰西学院文学大奖。 《礼拜五或太平洋上的灵薄狱》是一篇“现代文明衰亡记”的寓言，它戏仿笛福的名著《鲁滨孙漂流记》的题材，在主题上却反其道而行之。鲁滨孙孤独一人被弃荒岛后，按西方文明社会的模式将荒岛治理得井井有条。礼拜五来到荒岛后，非但没有被驯化为鲁滨孙的奴隶，反而以其自然的天性将文明的迹象破坏得一干二净，同时也慢慢影响了鲁滨孙，使这个西方文明的代表逐步抛弃了原有的文化传统，变成了一个

悟空传，ISBN：9787539139999，作者：

Comparing Google to an ordinary business islike comparing a rocket to an Edsel. No academic analysis orbystander’s account can capture it. Now Doug Edwards, EmployeeNumber 59, offers the first inside view of Google, giving readers achance to fully experience the bizarre mix of camaraderie andcompetition at this phenomenal company. Edwards, Google’s firstdirector of marketing and brand management, describes it as ithappened. We see the first, pioneering steps of Larry Page andSergey Brin, the company’s young, idiosyncratic partners; theevolution of the company’s famously nonhierarchical structure(where every employee finds a problem to tackle or a feature tocreate and works independently); the development of brand identity;the races to develop and implement each new feature; and the manyideas that never came to pass. Above all, Edwards—a formerjournalist who knows how to write—captures the “Google Experience,”the rollercoaster ride of being part of a company creating itselfin a whole new u

Daniel Johnson -- journalist, editor, scholar, and chessenthusiast who once played Garry Kasparov to a draw in asimultaneous exhibition -- is the perfect guide to one of history'smost remarkable periods, when chess matches were front-page newsand captured the world's imagination. The Cold War played out inmany areas: geopolitical alliances, military coalitions,cat-and-mouse espionage, the arms race, proxy wars -- and chess. Anessential pastime of Russian intellectuals and revolutionaries, andlater adopted by the Communists as a symbol of Soviet power, chesswas inextricably linked to the rise and fall of the "evil empire."This original narrative history recounts in gripping detail thesingular part the Immortal Game played in the Cold War. Fromchess's role in the Russian Revolution -- Marx, Lenin, and Trotskywere all avid players -- to the 1945 radio match when the Sovietscrushed the Americans, prompting Stalin's telegram "Well donelads!"; to the epic contest between Bobby Fischer and Boris Spasskyin 197

For over fifty years, Eudora Welty and William Maxwell, two ofour most admired writers, penned letters to each other. They sharedtheir worries about work and family, literary opinions andscuttlebutt, moments of despair and hilarity. Living half acontinent apart, their friendship was nourished and maintained bytheir correspondence. "What There Is to Say We Have Said" bearswitness to Welty and Maxwell's editorial relationships - both inhis capacity as New Yorker editor and in their collegial back-andforth on their work. It's also a chronicle of the literary world ofthe time; read talk of James Thurber, William Shawn, Katherine AnnePorter, J. D. Salinger, Isak Dinesen, William Faulkner, JohnUpdike, Virginia Woolf, Walker Percy, Ford Madox Ford, JohnCheever, and many more. It is a treasure trove of readingrecommendations.

The Tin Drum, one of the great novels of the twentiethcentury, was published in Ralph Manheim's outstanding translationin 1959. It became a runaway bestseller and catapulted its youngauthor to the forefront of world literature. To mark the fiftiethanniversary of the original publication, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt,along with Grass's publishers all over the world, is bringing out anew translation of this classic novel. Breon Mitchell, acclaimedtranslator and scholar, has drawn from many sources: from a wealthof detailed scholarship; from a wide range of newly-availablereference works; and from the author himself. The result is atranslation that is more faithful to Grass's style and rhythm,restores omissions, and reflects more fully the complexity of theoriginal work. After fifty years, THE TIN DRUM has, if anything,gained in power and relevance. All of Grass's amazing evocationsare still there, and still amazing: Oskar Matzerath, theindomitable drummer; his grandmother, Anna Koljaiczek; his mother,Agnes;