“The playful, spirited sequel to Routes continues the mythological history of the Black family in the 1930s and 1940s who continue their spiritual quests, worldly and otherworldly pursuits.” —Kirkus Reviews

John Okas begins a proposed series of novels investigating the ancestry of two nebulous characters, Arthur and Morning Black. Tracing their family tree, Okas takes this Alex Haley theme on a detour through the ribald pageantry of American history and culture. The result is a rich collage of characters and American icons whose stories are told in a savory and metaphorical voice ringing with social satire.

Discover how to eat for your sign and nourish your soul in Signs and Seasons, the one-of-a-kind cookbook that pairs chef-driven seasonal recipes with deep insight into how astrology shapes our appetites, from iconic astrologer Monte Farber and artist Amy Zerner.Food connects us to our families, history, culture, and to the natural world itself—to the seasons and the cycle of life. Just as our path around the sun—and through the Zodiac—dictates the seasons,...

**From the bestselling author of The Handmaid's Tale and The Testaments—a thrilling, funny, and thought-provoking collection of stories that affirms Atwood as our greatest creator of worlds—and as an incisive chronicler of our darkest impulses.“Alphinland,” the first of three loosely linked tales, introduces us to a fantasy writer who is guided through a stormy winter evening by the voice of her late husband. In “Lusus Naturae,” a young woman, monstrously...

National Book Award Finalist • A superb novel that delicately unearths the myriad manifestations of extraordinary love between ordinary people, from "one of our most gifted writers" (Chicago Tribune) and the winner of the PEN/Malamud Award"A near perfect book, as deep as it is broad in its humaneness, comedy and wisdom." —The Washington PostThe Feast of Love is just that—a sumptuous work of fiction about the thing that mos...

This account of growing up with a mentally ill mother "belongs on a shelf of classic memoirs, alongside The Liars' Club and Angela's Ashes" (Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times).As an NPR correspondent, Jacki Lyden visited some dangerous war zones—but her childhood was a war zone of a different kind.Lyden's mother suffered from what is now called bipolar disorder or manic depression. But in a small Wisconsin town in the sixties an...

From the Pulitzer prize winning author of A Thousand Acres, Jane Smiley, comes Ordinary Love and Good Will - two thematically linked novellas, both included in this ebook edition, exploring the elusive dream of the perfect family.Ordinary Love gives voice to a mother, loving but unsure of her love's value, who, in leaving her powerful husband, fears that she has done her children irrevocable harm . . .Good Will, by contrast, is t...

In The Mind-Body Problem, Katha Pollitt takes the ordinary events of life–her own and others’–and turns them into brilliant, poignant, and often funny poems that are full of surprises and originality. Pollitt’s imagination is stirred by conflict and juxtaposition, by the contrast (but also the connection) between logic and feeling, between the real and the transcendent, between our outer and inner selves: Jane Austen slides her manuscript under her blotter, bewildered youn...

Gloria Ausubel (1948- ) is a baby boomer who has tasted the palatable and unpalatable fare served up in the culture of the 60's, 70's, 80's, and 90's. Her poetry becomes a way of identification with the generation of alienation. In terms of skittish dabbling, vicarious participation, and prophetic yearning she takes a poetic stance to that generation. Her poems emanate from a specific time and place but have levels of meaning that can strike listeners from different generations. Her poems ...

A short story inspired by the Beatles' song "Rocky Raccoon".

WingsWe returned to the woods from a three-day journeythrough the dizzy land of the casino.Today's a Saturday morning resurrection.Somewhere in my family DNA, a Christiansings the Sermon on the Mount,the only words in the Book that matter.Across the web, Mozart thrills anyone who needs,who dares to listen. In every note, he sacrificed his life,as if he had no cares about legacy.Little Billie watches me with pensive, ...

**From the Printz Award-winning author of I’ll Give You the Sun comes a story of a young girl’s struggle to sort her own melody out of the noise around her.“Both a profound meditation on loss and grieving and an exhilarating and very sexy romance.”—NPR“How grief and love run side by side is sensitively and intensely explored in this energetic, poetic, and warm-blooded novel.”—The Guardian**One boy helps her remember. The other helps her forget....