A DAZZLING NEW NOVEL FROM NATIONAL BESTSELLING AND GMA BOOK CLUB PICK MARGARITA MONTIMORE, AUTHOR OF OONA OUT OF ORDER
"[A] twisty, genre-defying family drama...Reminiscent of Taylor Jenkins Reid's Daisy Jones & the Six." --Shelf Awareness (starred review) Nearly a decade ago, iconic magician Violet Volk performed her greatest trick yet: vanishing mid-act. While Violet sought out the spotlight, her sister Sasha, had to be the responsible one. But Sasha can never seem to escape her sister's tumultuous orbit. Then there's Cameron Frank, determined to finally get his big break hosting a podcast devoted to all things Violet--though keeping his job hinges on an exclusive interview with Sasha, the last person who wants to talk to him. As the ten-year anniversary approaches, the podcast picks up steam, and Cameron's pursuit of Sasha becomes increasingly intrusive. Meanwhile, Sasha begins to experience an unsettling series of sleepwalking episodes and coincidences, which all lead back to Violet. Pushed to her emotional limits, Sasha must finally confront the most painful truths about her sister, and herself, even at the risk of losing everything. Alternating between Sasha's narration and Cameron's podcast transcripts, interspersed with documents that offer a tantalizing peek at Violet herself, Acts of Violet is an utterly original, propulsive story of fame, deception, and forgiveness that will make you believe in magic.
A DAZZLING NEW NOVEL FROM NATIONAL BESTSELLING AND GMA BOOK CLUB PICK MARGARITA MONTIMORE, AUTHOR OF OONA OUT OF ORDER
"[A] twisty, genre-defying family drama...Reminiscent of Taylor Jenkins Reid's Daisy Jones & the Six." --Shelf Awareness (starred review) Nearly a decade ago, iconic magician Violet Volk performed her greatest trick yet: vanishing mid-act. While Violet sought out the spotlight, her sister Sasha, had to be the responsible one. But Sasha can never seem to escape her sister's tumultuous orbit. Then there's Cameron Frank, determined to finally get his big break hosting a podcast devoted to all things Violet--though keeping his job hinges on an exclusive interview with Sasha, the last person who wants to talk to him. As the ten-year anniversary approaches, the podcast picks up steam, and Cameron's pursuit of Sasha becomes increasingly intrusive. Meanwhile, Sasha begins to experience an unsettling series of sleepwalking episodes and coincidences, which all lead back to Violet. Pushed to her emotional limits, Sasha must finally confront the most painful truths about her sister, and herself, even at the risk of losing everything. Alternating between Sasha's narration and Cameron's podcast transcripts, interspersed with documents that offer a tantalizing peek at Violet herself, Acts of Violet is an utterly original, propulsive story of fame, deception, and forgiveness that will make you believe in magic.
In this wise and dazzling work of fiction, Nobel laureate Saul Bellow writes comically and tragically about the tenacity of first love. The story behind The Actual belongs to Harry Trellman, an aging, astute businessman who has never belonged anywhere: not in the Chicago orphanage where he was sent by his mother, not in high school (too brainy), not even on the streets, where his vaguely Asian features set him apart from the rest of the pack. As for human attachments, they are like everything else in his life, singular and irregular. But Harry has always been a keen observer -- a trait not unnoticed by billionaire Sigmund Adletsky, who retains Harry as his adviser on human affairs. The two men discuss ordinary things, but the older man is also sharp enough to realize that, behind his stoic mask, Harry harbors some intense feelings for a certain woman. That woman -- the object of some forty years' passion -- is Amy Wustrin, a twice-divorced interior designer who's walked through her share of life's ups and downs. Thanks to Sigmund, she walks unexpectedly into Harry's life. And this time he's not about to let her go.
David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas meets Octavia Butler's Earthseed series, as acclaimed author Monica Byrne (The Girl in the Road) crafts an unforgettable piece of speculative fiction about where humanity came from, where we are now, and where we're going--and how, in every age, the same forces that drive us apart also bind us together.
A stone-cold masterpiece.--New Scientist
The Actual Star takes readers on a journey over two millennia and six continents--telling three powerful tales a thousand years apart, all of them converging in the same cave in the Belizean jungle.
Braided together are the stories of a pair of teenage twins who ascend the throne of a Maya kingdom; a young American woman on a trip of self-discovery in Belize; and two dangerous charismatics vying for the leadership of a new religion, racing toward a confrontation that will determine the fate of the few humans left on Earth after massive climate change.
In each era, a reincarnated trinity of souls navigates the entanglements of tradition and progress, sister and stranger, and love and hate--until all of their age-old questions about the nature of existence converge deep underground, where only in complete darkness can they truly see.
--Library Journal Sena Jeter Naslund, the New York Times bestselling author of Ahab's Wife, Four Spirits, and Abundance explores both the dark nature of fundamentalism and the brightness of true faith in her dazzling novel, Adam & Eve. A provocative, eloquent, and deeply compelling story of a woman caught between two warring worlds--science and religion--Adam & Eve raises timely questions about identity, innocence, and sin, and represents a new literary high-water mark for New York Times Notable author and Harper Lee Award-winner Naslund.
--Library Journal Sena Jeter Naslund, the New York Times bestselling author of Ahab's Wife, Four Spirits, and Abundance explores both the dark nature of fundamentalism and the brightness of true faith in her dazzling novel, Adam & Eve. A provocative, eloquent, and deeply compelling story of a woman caught between two warring worlds--science and religion--Adam & Eve raises timely questions about identity, innocence, and sin, and represents a new literary high-water mark for New York Times Notable author and Harper Lee Award-winner Naslund.
Having just unexpectedly quit her job as a waitress, Evelyn returns home one day to find Adam sleeping with one of his customers. Calmly, but quickly, Evelyn packs her belongings and runs off to Hungary on a vacation she had originally planned to take with Adam. Accompanying Evelyn on her journey is her friend Simone and Michael, Simone's West German cousin. In hot pursuit, however, to everyone's surprise or dismay, is Adam. Following the group in his family's rickety 1961 Communist-made automobile, Adam chases after Evelyn, banishing himself from his Garden of Eden as she pursues her very own idea of heaven. As Adam and Evelyn are swept out on a Western tide of new freedoms--helping refugees and helping themselves to impetuous trysts with others along the way--they find themselves forced to adjust to life in a world forever changed. Paradise regained? Perhaps not.
Upending our expectations from the start, "Adam and Evelyn" is a deceptively simple love story that will enthrall longtime readers and those new to the delights of Ingo Schulze's stories alike.
In this comic novel of political intrigue, Adam Gorozpe, a respected businessman in Mexico, has a life so perfect that he might as well be his namesake in the Garden of Eden--but there are snakes in this Eden too. For one thing, Adam's wife Priscila has fallen in love with the brash director of national security--also named Adam--who uses violence against token victims to hide the fact that he's letting drug runners, murderers, and kidnappers go free. Another unlikely snake is the little Boy-God who's started preaching in the street wearing a white tunic and stick-on wings, inspiring Adam's brother-in-law to give up his job writing soap operas to follow this junior deity and implore Adam to do the same. Even Elle, Adam's mistress, thinks the boy is important to their salvation--especially now that it seems the other Adam has put out a contract on Adam Gorozpe. To save his relationship, his marriage, his life, and the soul of his country, perhaps Adam will indeed have to call upon the wrath of the angels to expel all these snakes from his Mexican Eden.
From the author also known as Beth Kery--famed for the steamy serial novel Because You Are Mine...
All it takes is one moment for your life to change--one night of desire to make you feel alive...
Irish film director Rill Pierce fled to the tiny backwoods town of Vulture's Canyon, seeking sanctuary and solitude after a devastating tragedy. Once, his raw sex appeal and sultry Irish accent made women across the globe swoon. Now, he's barely recognizable.
But Katie Hughes, his best friend's sister, is not the type of woman to give up on a man like Rill. She blazes into Vulture's Canyon, determined to save him from himself. Instead, she finds herself unleashing years of pent-up passion. In a storm of hunger and need, Katie and Rill forget themselves and the world. But will Rill's insatiable attraction to Katie heal his pain--or will it just feed the darkness within him?
Addio, Love Monster is a novel told in linked stories spanning generations on the "regular" yet remarkable Singer Street of fictional midcentury Mulberry Park, just outside of Chicago. Marrocco transports you fully into this small world where Signora Giuseppa, the "iron fist" of Singer Street, does everything it takes to keep her grown children very near her, no matter what. Where Enrico the widower creeps in the night looking for a new wife in all the wrong places. Where Nicky the golden-gloves boxer wrestles with what he saw in the basement as a child-and Lena, his wife, also wrestles-with how to deal with Nicky's violence. Each story follows one person, but together they are the story of the neighborhood, a neighborhood that faces life together, whether they like it or not. In these pages you will find humor and sorrow, resentment and adoration, and the churn and change of a neighborhood where everyone knows everyone both two much and too little as time marches on.
Praise for Addio, Love Monster
"In rich, descriptive prose peppered with salty dialogue, Christina Marrocco gives us a penetrating look at several generations of a Sicilian immigrant family. Bookmarked on either end of this novel in stories are two tales focusing upon professional mourner and matriarch Giuseppa Millefiore, who teaches her family that "everything dies"-but not before the entire clan loves, laughs, and dips deep into the gusto that characterizes Italian-American life."
-Rita Ciresi, author of Pink Slip and Sometimes I Dream in Italian
"Joyce had his Dublin, Ferrante, her Naples, and for Marrocco it's Mulberry Park, where not much seems to happen, and yet something's always going on if you look beneath the surface. Marrocco finds the extraordinary in the lives of the folk who inhabit this sleepy suburb of Chicago, creating stories of individuals that she forms into a lively word tapestry, capturing days of lives gone by, reminding us that everyone has a story to tell."
-Fred L. Gardaphé, author of From Wise Guys to Wise Men
"In Addio, Love Monster, Christina Marrocco has created a world that pulses with life. At the center of that life is the Millefiore family and their iron-fisted matriarch, Giuseppa. Set in fictional Mulberry Park, a suburb of Chicago, on the largely Sicilian-settled Singer Street, Marrocco's novel-in-stories creates a place that is both familiar and wonderfully strange, a slice of a past time where families and neighbors squabble and gossip and judge, but most of all, they share a love that outstrips those lesser emotions. A wonderful first book by an author with a keen eye and a skillful touch."
-Patrick Parks, author of Tucumcari
"With a unique and captivating voice and astounding attention to details, Christina Marrocco immerses us in the lives of a multi-generational immigrant family with her debut novel. I know well, these people of Mulberry Park, her fictional, working class, Sicilian-American neighborhood near Chicago. In this sharply focused snapshot of the midcentury Southern Italian immigrant experience, Marrocco populates Addio, Love Monster with people as real as it gets. I love this book."
-Karen Tintori, author of Unto the Daughters: The Legacy of an Honor Killing in a Sicilian-American Family
Addis Ababa is a sprawling melting pot of cultures where rich and poor live side by side in relative harmony--until they don't.
Several of the 14 stories here, most of them striking and accomplished, involve post-revolution loss, guilt and revenge. Some are surreal--fitting for a culture where, as Mengiste writes in her introduction, 'there are men who live in the mountains of Ethiopia and can turn into hyenas.'
--Washington Post
While most stories told about or set in Africa deny the continent and the nearly 60 countries that constitute it narrative complexity, this anthology works overtime to get specific about the people and problems that define Addis Ababa.
--Los Angeles Review of Books
Maaza Mengiste's story Dust, Ash, Flight has won the 2021 Edgar Award for Best Short Story, presented by the Mystery Writers of America!
Addis is one of Africa's--and the world's--most vibrant, dynamic scene, and the new Akashic collection displays it in all its complexity. With acclaimed writer Maaza Mengiste at the editing helm, the book brings together an exciting collection of voices exploring the city's noir side. This is a chance for readers to discover an important literary scene and to explore a city's past and present.
--CrimeReads, One of the Most Anticipated Crime Books of 2020
Addis Ababa Noir is a beautiful read, and it succeeds in the historical excavation it undertakes...[It] is a powerful collection, carefully curated and plunging unexpected depths.
--New Frame
[The book's] strength is these writer's unflinching approach to reality...The other major plus is the opportunity to discover many accomplished Ethiopian writers. A book to definitely explore."
--Dispatches from Ethiopia
A taut collection of thrilling stories that encompasses modes from the realistic to the uncanny.
--Vol. 1 Brooklyn
"Editor Maaza Mengiste takes the idea of Noir well beyond the well trod paths of crime stories. Mengiste's vision of Noir embraces myth, memory and the paranormal."
--Ink19
Akashic Books continues its award-winning series of original noir anthologies, launched in 2004 with Brooklyn Noir. Each book comprises all new stories, each one set in a distinct neighborhood or location within the respective city.
Brand-new stories by: Maaza Mengiste, Adam Reta, Mahtem Shiferraw, Linda Yohannes, Sulaiman Addonia, Meron Hadero, Mikael Awake, Lelissa Girma, Rebecca Fisseha, Solomon Hailemariam, Girma T. Fantaye, Teferi Nigussie Tafa, Hannah Giorgis, and Bewketu Seyoum.
From the introduction by Maaza Mengiste:
What marks life in Addis Ababa are the starkly different realities coexisting in one place. It's a growing city taking shape beneath the fraught weight of history, myth, and memory. It is a heady mix. It can also be disorienting, and it is in this space that the stories of Addis Ababa Noir reside...
These are not gentle stories. They cross into forbidden territories and traverse the damaged terrain of the human heart. The characters in these pages are complicated, worthy of our judgment as much as they somehow manage to elude it. The writers have each discovered their own ways to get us to lean in while forcing us to grit our teeth as we draw closer...
Despite the varied and distinct voices in these pages, no single book can contain all of the wonderful, intriguing, vexing complexities of Addis Ababa. But what you will read are stories by some of Ethiopia's most talented writers living in the country and abroad. Each of them considers the many ways that myth and truth and a country's dark edges come together to create something wholly original--and unsettling.
--Boston Globe An absolutely delightful tale of obsessive-compulsive love, Toni Jordan's Addition is just the ticket for fans of TV's Monk and readers who were captivated by The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. A wonderfully funny, supremely intelligent debut novel, Addition is "witty fun" (People), while OCD-afflicted heroine Grace and her new-found paramour Seamus are "thoroughly endearing characters, and their romance is sweet and fun" (Washington Post Book World).