A New York Times Notable Book: The richly imagined fictional life of one of cinema's founding fathers from National Book Award finalist Jim ShepardIn 1907, while waiting for a train that would take him from his quiet rural hometown to university in cosmopolitan Berlin, Friedrich Wilhelm Plumpe met Hans Ehrenbaum-Degele, the great passion of his life. Hans was the catalyst for Plumpe's transformation into F. W. Murnau, the filmmaker best known for di...

A shy and apolitical herpetologist-in-training finds the weight of history bearing down on him as the effects of repression ramp up in his countryIn an unspecified country that combines elements of Chile under its military regime, South Africa under apartheid, and Italy under fascism, fifteen-year-old Karel Roeder asks only to be left alone to learn from Albert, his mentor at the zoo's reptile house, and to devote himself to his girlfriend, Leda. But both Leda and A...

The acclaimed National Book Award finalist—“one of the United States’ finest writers,” according to Joshua Ferris, “full of wit, humanity, and fearless curiosity”—now gives us a novel that will join the short list of classics about children caught up in the Holocaust.Aron, the narrator, is an engaging if peculiar and unhappy young boy whose family is driven by the German onslaught from the Polish countryside into Warsaw and slowly battered by deprivation, disease, and persecution. ...

A thirteen-year-old hatches a plan of escape, solace, and utter independence through a dream of flight that's both literal and figurative in this engrossing novel by National Book Award finalist Jim ShepardAs beset by the world as any thirteen-year-old—and maybe a little more so—Biddy Siebert does his best to negotiate both the intimacies and isolations of his world and his own maddening and slightly comical idiosyncrasies. His ferocious younger sister hates everyon...

A New York Times Notable Book: A lethal accident turns life into a waking nightmare for a mother and her son in this gripping novel of secrecy and dreadAbandoned by her husband, Joanie Mucherino and her eleven-year-old son, Todd, struggle to cope while dealing with their comically tactless and intrusive Italian family. Further complicating things, Joanie now seems available to Bruno Minea, an old family friend whose two-decade passion for her has be...

In the wilderness of junior high, Edwin Hanratty is at the bottom of the food chain. His teachers find him a nuisance. His fellow students consider him prey. And although his parents are not oblivious to his troubles, they can't quite bring themselves to fathom the ruthless forces that demoralize him daily.Sharing in these schoolyard indignities is his only friend, Flake. Branded together as misfits, their fury simmers quietly in the hallways, classrooms, and at home, until an unth...

I’ve been a problem baby, a lousy son, a distant brother, an off-putting neighbor, a piss-poor student, a worrisome seatmate, an unreliable employee, a bewildering lover, a frustrating confidante and a crappy husband. Among the things I do pretty well at this point I’d have to list darts, re-closing Stay-Fresh boxes, and staying out of the way.This is the self-eulogy offered early on by the unwilling hero of the opening story in this collection, a dazzling array of work in...

A Vintage Shorts “Short Story Month” SelectionVelibor Vasovic is not political. He is a soccer player; has played for Partizan Belgrade and his national team. Scored Partizan’s only goal against Real Madrid in the European Cup. He is the rock supporting any defense. But in 1966, he starts playing for Ajax Amsterdam, firmly in the West. And politics catches up to him.Jim Shepard is the wildly inventive guru of the historical fiction short story; a finalist for the National B...

Culling the vastness of experience—from its bizarre fringes and breathtaking pinnacles to the mediocre and desperately below average—like an expert curator, Jim Shepard populates this collection with characters at once wildly diverse and wholly fascinating.A “black world” operative can’t tell his wife a word about his daily activities, but doesn’t resist sharing her confidences. A young Alpine researcher is smitten by the girlfriend of his dead brother, killed in an avalanche he be...

A Segunda Guerra Mundial vista pelos olhos de um garoto no gueto de Varsóvia.Em meio à guerra que assola a Europa, uma família é arrastada de sua casa no interior da Polônia até Varsóvia, um caldeirão de pobreza, doenças e perseguições.O garoto Aron ajuda como pode, fazendo pequenos contrabandos para manter a família viva. Separado dos pais, acaba num orfanato, onde acasos e tragédias darão uma forma ainda mais brutal para sua vida.Narrado do ponto de ...

**"Shepard may be the best lesser-known film critic." —The New York Times Book ReviewThe first book of nonfiction from one of our great fiction writers.**Given that most Americans proudly consider themselves non-political, where do our notions of collective responsibility come from? Which self-deceptions, when considering ourselves as actors on the world stage, do we cling to most tenaciously? Why do we so stubbornly believe, for example, that our country always me...

Aron, ein kleiner polnisch-jüdischer Junge, ist in seiner nicht gerade kleinen, armen Familie so etwas wie eine Katastrophe auf zwei Beinen. Nichts will ihm so recht glücken und alles macht er kaputt. Doch halb Tom Sawyer, halb Simplicius er ist ein guter Kerl. Aron hat leider keine Zeit, ein vernünftiger Erwachsener zu werden. Denn seine Familie zieht nach Warschau, die Deutschen überfallen Polen und die Juden werden ins Ghetto gepfercht. Er freundet sich mit einer Gruppe Jugendlicher an,...