"An exhilarating volume that will ratchet up the joy for all reading groups "Wendy Lesser's extraordinary alertness, intelligence, and curiosity have made her one of America's most significant cultural critics," writes Stephen Greenblatt. In Why I Read, Lesser draws on a lifetime of pleasure reading and decades of editing one of the most distinguished little magazines in the country, The Threepenny Review, to describe a life lived in and through literature....

Umberto Eco was an international cultural superstar. In this, his last collection, the celebrated essayist and novelist observes the changing world around him with irrepressible curiosity and profound wisdom. He sees with fresh eyes the upheaval in ideological values, the crises in politics, and the unbridled individualism that have become the backdrop of our lives-a "liquid" society in which it's not easy to find a polestar, though stars and starlets...

In this dark work, perhaps the finest Irish novel of the nineteenth century, two mismatched cousins fight it out over love and fortune. Love comes easily to beautiful Francie. She weds the man loved by the ungainly, practical Charlotte-who then sets out to ruin her cousin's marriage.

Gerald Arbuthnot receives a promotion from Lord Illingworth, a worldly politician who has a sordid history of women, one of whom is Gerald's widowed mother. When their connection is revealed, the young man questions his past, present and future aspirations. A Woman of No Importance opens with a high-class party featuring a group of society's most illustrious citizens. In the midst of the event, Gerald Arbuthnot enters and announces his new position...

"One of the most rigorously presented and beautifully illustrated critical testaments in all of literature."-Boston Globe "A brilliant, original approach to literature, a key to Calvino's own work and a thoroughly delightful and illuminating commentary on some of the world's greatest writing."-San Francisco Chronicle At the time of his death, Italo Calvino was at work on six lectures setting forth the qualities in writing he most valued, and which...

"In The Writer's Crusade, author Tom Roston examines the connection between Vonnegut's life and Slaughterhouse-Five. Did Vonnegut suffer from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder? Did Billy Pilgrim? Roston probes Vonnegut's work, his personal history, and discarded drafts of the novel, as well as original interviews with the writer's family, friends, scholars, psychologists, and other novelists including Karl Marlantes, Kevin Powers, and Tim O'Brien. The...

An intimate narrative exploring the past, present, and future of books… Four seismic shifts have rocked human communication: the invention of writing, the alphabet, mechanical type and the printing press, and digitization. Poised over this fourth transition, e-reader in one hand, perfect-bound book in the other, Merilyn Simonds - author, literary maven, and early adopter - asks herself: what is lost and what is gained as paper turns to pixel? Gutenberg's...

In the world of books and literature, "hype" is associated with bestsellerism - the books that sell the most, are read by vast numbers, and constantly talked about in media and staff rooms. Often, it is the success in itself that generates an interest because popularity begets popularity. Quite often though, a hyped bestseller is met with a skeptic criticism of poor language, a badly constructed plot, a predictable story line, or all three. The bestseller...

Benevolent billionaire Justin Wolfe establishes an autonomous economic experiment on a farm near Savannah, Georgia. The theory: give people the means to advance in life through daily direct deposits and even the formerly homeless can become entrepreneurs who contribute meaningfully to society. Wolfe tasks economics whiz kid Evan White to roll out an advanced economic system that creates a higher standard of living than most citizens in neighboring...

This book "Heavy heart in Silence" is vent for people who went through the difficult chapters of their life in silence. It comprises the agony and resilience of the broken soul which time would heal. The heartbreak that would take more time to heal is the one that was never shared. Let this book be a place where we could share and heal.