Starting with my childhood, and throughout my entire life, Istanbul provided me with a rich and broad understanding of storytelling… witnessed skyscrapers being raised to the skies around the glorious historical areas… yet ironically, I also watched those skyscrapers being surrounded by jerry-built tenements. I sadly watched the spectacular fabric of this city getting more and more polluted over time, including its green hills… also pillaged and destroyed its beautiful woodlands in a blink of an eye! I don’t believe any other populace in any other place has been as inattentive or negligent as Istanbul. I wrote over hundred stories by using a plain, natural, and in straightforward narrative style. Objectively, to the best of my abilities, I tried portraying the people of Istanbul; who are neither urban nor are rustic folks, but a mixture of both in their truest forms.

Fans of Jodi Picoult, Susan Lewis, Mitch Alborn and Alice Sebold will love this mesmerising, emotive and enthralling novel from international bestselling author Catherine Ryan Hyde. 'An extraordinary and unforgettable book - powerful, poignant and incredibly moving. I read the whole thing at a sitting, and absolutely loved it' -- SUSAN LEWIS 'Compelling new book' -- Woman's Own '...powerful emotions are aroused. A compelling, thoughtful read' -- Choice Magazine 'Impossible to put down' -- ***** Reader review 'This book is AMAZING!!!' -- ***** Reader review 'An absolutely amazing read which drew me in from the first page and wouldn't let me go until I had finished' -- ***** Reader review 'Very well-written...a gripping tale' -- ***** Reader review ********************************************************************************** SHE'S BEEN GIVEN A CHANCE TO LIVE, BUT DOES SHE KNOW HOW? One girl: Vida is nineteen, very sick, and has spent her short life preparing for death. But a new chance brings its own story, because for Vida to live, someone had to die. One man: Richard has just lost his beloved wife in a car accident. He hasn't even begun to address his grief, but feels compelled to meet the girl who inherited his wife's heart. Someone else's heart: In hospital Vida sees Richard and immediately falls in love. Of course he dismisses her as a foolish child. But is she? Can two people be bound by a second hand heart?

Are Walter’s “uncles” really ex-bank robbers? He’s about to spend a summer with them and find out! Poor Walter! His mom, Mae, an irresponsible beauty past her prime and down on her luck, has dumped him off with his two eccentric old “uncles,” Hub and Garth. Mae’s convinced that the old men have millions stashed away from bank robberies—and she’s determined that she and Walter deserve a piece of the pie. So while Mae’s off trying to find a husband, Walter tries to make himself at home in the company of these older, grumpier men—and some other relatives that are equally determined to get their share of the family assets. Soon Walter is transfixed and transformed by the stories Garth tells of his and Hub’s dashing younger years: how they were in the French Foreign Legion and how Hub won the love of the Sultan’s daughter and evaded the jealous Sheik’s assassins. Are Hub and Garth sitting on a fortune, or is that a story too? And who’s going to get it if they are?

James Jones's spiritual beliefs were central to his great World War II trilogy From Here to Eternity. The Thin Red Line, and Whistle, as well as to the rest of his fiction. In this first book-length exploration of the subject, Steven Carter argues that Jones's ideas about reincarnation, karma, and spiritual evolution were heavily influenced by transcendentalism, theosophy, and Oriental religions. The author places Jones in what he identifies as a tradition of American literary Orientalism that includes Emerson, Thoreau, Kerouac, Ginsberg, and others. Carter bases his argument on extensive research into American literature and criticism coupled with visits and personal correspondence with Jones.

Aint Nothin Like Em has taken years in the making. It is the inspiration of many eventspersonal and historical passages in life. The poet sees the world, as Bob Kaufman says, as a fish with frogs eyes. The soul kitchenthe battle hymnsthe heartbeatsthe reflections/dedications are the openings of doors to her soul. Enter, enjoy, and reflect. Aint Nothin Like Em is a book of poetry written in the Tradition of Grandma/ Mother/Daughter/Sister Speak. Roomed with the ritual aromas of yams, collards and seasoned to perfection chicken: Sunday Supper preparations, the poems are a Gathering of Kitchen Table Comfort, found only in the sharing of Wimmin Words. Tell it Like it T.I. IS. and Yeah Girl, Been There Before Conversations and Revelations, are served up straightening comb hot. A resilience that she beckons to us to strut proudly on our Wimmin tongues with a sway as gentle and graceful as our rounded hips. - Nikki Williams, Author/Artist, Brown Women Who Fly, Beautiful, Also, are the Souls of My People Kamernebti Mer Amons writings in Aint Nothin Like Em tells a story of African American family life from Sunday morning biscuits to loving your mate, to language of struggle for Black family survival. An intimate read. John Watusi Branch Executive Director, Afrikan Poetry Theatre

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A symphonic oral history about the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the emergence of a new Russia, from Svetlana Alexievich, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE WASHINGTON POST AND PUBLISHERS WEEKLY • LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE WINNER One of the New York Times’s 100 Best Books of the 21st Century When the Swedish Academy awarded Svetlana Alexievich the Nobel Prize, it cited her for inventing “a new kind of literary genre,” describing her work as “a history of emotions—a history of the soul.” Alexievich’s distinctive documentary style, combining extended individual monologues with a collage of voices, records the stories of ordinary women and men who are rarely given the opportunity to speak, whose experiences are often lost in the official histories of the nation. In Secondhand Time, Alexievich chronicles the demise of communism. Everyday Russian citizens recount the past thirty years, showing us what life was like during the fall of the Soviet Union and what it’s like to live in the new Russia left in its wake. Through interviews spanning 1991 to 2012, Alexievich takes us behind the propaganda and contrived media accounts, giving us a panoramic portrait of contemporary Russia and Russians who still carry memories of oppression, terror, famine, massacres—but also of pride in their country, hope for the future, and a belief that everyone was working and fighting together to bring about a utopia. Here is an account of life in the aftermath of an idea so powerful it once dominated a third of the world. A magnificent tapestry of the sorrows and triumphs of the human spirit woven by a master, Secondhand Time tells the stories that together make up the true history of a nation. “Through the voices of those who confided in her,” The Nation writes, “Alexievich tells us about human nature, about our dreams, our choices, about good and evil—in a word, about ourselves.” A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: The New York Times, The Boston Globe, The Wall Street Journal, NPR, Financial Times, Kirkus Reviews