IN THIS SUITE of five short pieces — one of the unqualified literary masterpieces of the American 1960s — William Gass finds five beautiful forms in which to explore the signature theme of his fiction: the solitary soul's poignant, conflicted,...
It's August 1946—one year after the Japanese surrender — and women are turning up dead all over Tokyo. Detective Minami of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police — irreverent, angry, despairing — goes on the hunt for a killer known as the Japanese...
On an ordinary day at a girl's school, two students are reported missing. The subsequent search involves the neighboring widower Old Mr. Rock and his granddaughter and her fiance, and uncovers the hidden lusts, ambitions, suspicions and...
The Cannibal was John Hawkes's first novel, published in 1949.
"No synopsis conveys the quality of this now famous novel about an hallucinated Germany in collapse after World War II. John Hawkes, in his search for a means to transcend...
Tina Bender is the gossip columnist at the infamous L.A. Informer tabloid. She knows everything about everyone who's anyone. And she's not afraid to print it. That is, until she receives a threatening note, promising, "If you don't stop writing...
A woman who leads a quiet life, keeping other people at a cool distance, one day utters an idle wish to be struck by lightning — and her wish is granted. Instead of killing her, this cataclysmic event marks a strange and powerful new beginning....
First published in 1856, five years after the appearance of Moby Dick, The Piazza Tales comprises six of Herman Melville's finest short stories. Included are two sea tales that encompass the essence of Melville's art: 'Benito Cereno,' an...
As Tom Dudley took his turn on watch, he looked with horror on the bodies of his crew.
Their ribs and hip bones were already showing through their wasting flesh. There were angry, ulcerating sores on their elbows, knees and feet, their lips were...